


The Scientist's Courtship

by PorterBailey



Series: The Scientist's Experiment [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: 1800s, 19th Century, F/F, F/M, Mad Science, Mad Scientists, Mpreg, New York City, Post Mpreg, Washington D.C.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:53:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27105268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PorterBailey/pseuds/PorterBailey
Summary: When Zeke Howell's friends, Carla and Frieda, want to have a baby but can't, Zeke decides to step in and redo his original experiment, despite swearing it off since the first time.(Sequel to first work, "The Scientist's Experiment." I will post it here at some point, but for right now, here's a link to the first chapter on deviantArt: https://www.deviantart.com/porter-bailey/art/The-Scientist-s-Experiment-Chapter-One-472714062)
Relationships: Frieda/Carla, Zeke/Penelope
Series: The Scientist's Experiment [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1978402
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "If I could only turn back the clock/to when God and her were born,   
> Come in, she said/I'll give ya,   
> Shelter from the storm."   
> -Bob Dylan ("Shelter from the Storm")
> 
> “When you came into the world, you cried, and it broke my heart.”  
> -Lin Manuel-Miranda (Hamilton/ “Dear Theodosia”)

“And so, through the examination of the exposed spinal column,” Zeke said, peeling back the corpse’s skin, “we can see how the cord stretches from the base of the skull to the bottom of the sacrum.”  
His students peered over the prone corpse, writing, or sketching diligently in their notebooks.  
“As we’ve learned, when the cord becomes severed, many of the body’s functions become impaired, not just walking, but digestive and bowel functions. If the severing is high enough, it can even impair functions of the lungs.” Dr. Howell removed a small scalpel and used it to point to the exposed cervical section of the spine. “Looking closely, we can see the severe fracture in C2, which means he most likely died from a broken neck. The epidermal bruising in the cervical area is another key sign. Now, while this kind of fracture can be survivable, it is rare.”  
Someone cleared their throat and knocked on the door. The door of the surgical theater was wide open, and all heads looked up. Dean Bergstrom looked at the professor expectantly and impatiently. A young girl stood next to him, flush with embarrassment. All the students immediately avoided Howell’s and Bergstrom’s gaze; they knew what was coming. Zeke excused himself, feeling a little flushed himself.  
“Dean Bergstrom. What a pleasure, sir.”  
“I wish I could say the same, Dr. Howell,” the Dean said, his mouth a tight line of frustration. “I found this one wandering around the mathematics and science building. I assume she belongs to you.”  
Zeke looked down at his daughter, who was avoiding his gaze as much as his students. Looking directly at the floor, Agatha walked over to her father and waited.  
“She does. Terribly sorry for the inconvenience, sir. It won’t happen again.”  
“See that it doesn’t. Unattended minors on campus aren’t allowed. And bringing offspring to work is prohibited.” Agatha flushed a deeper shade of scarlet.  
“Understood, sir. My apologies,” Zeke said stiffly. He wrapped a firm hand around Agatha’s shoulder. As the Dean walked away, he turned to face her. “Care to explain what you’re doing out of school so early, young lady?”  
“Ms. Spencer sent me home.”  
“Why?”  
She turtled her neck inward. “I was fighting…”  
Zeke knew the answer before she said it. He could see the scrapes and cuts on her body, and one of her eyes was beginning to blacken. He sighed deeply and pinched the bridge of his nose. Zeke eyed the classroom, and his eavesdropping students suddenly looked very busy.  
“Why didn’t you go to my office?”  
“It was locked. And your normal classroom was empty, so I just…” Agatha trailed off. Her already red face flushed darker.  
He pulled his watch out of his breast pocket.  
“I have forty minutes left in this lecture. I need you to sit quietly and read. This doesn’t mean you’re getting out of punishment; it just means we’ll have to discuss this later.”  
Aggie nodded sheepishly and followed him back into the surgery theater like a dog with a tail between its legs. She settled into the seating at the front row and immediately took out a book to hide behind. As Zeke rejoined his students, they all suddenly looked very interested in their notes or bare hands.  
“So,” Howell said, clearing his throat, “for the cushion between the sections of bone, can anyone tell me what they’re called and made of?”  
All students’ eyes wandered over to Agatha, who, though still having her book to her face, had her hand straight in the air. Zeke sighed and grit his teeth.  
“Does anyone _besides_ my daughter know the answer?”  
\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
“Ow!”  
“I know, just stop fidgeting. Almost done.”  
Agatha tried not to squirm in her seat at the kitchen table, but the wound cleaning process always stung. Zeke closely examined her knuckles, making sure he’d removed all the dirt. After wrapping them in gauze, he walked to the icebox and chipped of a large chunk of ice, quickly wrapping it in a handkerchief.  
“For your eye,” he said, handing it to Aggie.  
“Thank you.”  
“You know, if you didn’t pick as many scraps as you do, we wouldn’t have to do this so often,” Zeke said, looking knowingly at Aggie, but smirking a little.  
“Liam was picking on me again.”  
“You can’t let him get to you. There will always be a ‘Liam’ in life, and you can’t always fight them with fists.”  
“Can’t I use my fists while I still can?”  
“No. This is a pacifist household.”  
“Says you.”  
“Yes, says I. The person who owns and runs the house. He who pays the mortgage, cooks the meals, and cares for the child.”  
He licked his thumb and scrubbed it against a blotch of dirt on her face.  
“Ew!” Aggie protested.  
“I’ve told you. Father spit is the one true cleaning solution,” Zeke grinned.  
He picked up one of her hands and examined it. Thin red lines ran over the back of it, and near identical ones were on the other.  
“Looks like Ms. Spencer got after you with the yard stick. Again,” Zeke frowned.  
Aggie nodded. “For fighting. And,” she sighed, “for talking about...medical stuff.”  
“Oh no…” Zeke rubbed his face.  
“I was just telling her what you do for a living. It wasn’t my fault she thinks corpses are gross.”  
“Honey, sometimes that kind of stuff makes people uncomfortable.”  
“And I was trying to tell her there’s nothing weird about it!” Agatha said, fiddling with the ice. “You just look at a lot of dead people. And then medical students learn about the human body. Ms. Spencer didn’t like that, so she rapped my hands. What does ‘sacrilegious’ mean?”  
Zeke covered his face with his hands and took some deep breaths. “It means Ms. Spencer and I wouldn’t get along.”  
“If you don’t like her, why can’t I just come to your classes?”  
“Because it’s more or less illegal. You haven’t finished high school, yet. And you’re not properly enrolled at the college. Besides, I’d get in serious trouble if you came to work with me every day. I’d probably get fired. And why didn’t you go straight home today? You have a house key for a reason!”  
Agatha lowered her eyes. “I left it on my dresser…”  
“I put it on a string so you could wear it!”  
“I forgot! I’m sorry!”  
“We’ll figure something out, so you don’t forget again. In the meantime, I need to make dinner and you need to do homework.”  
The phone rang from the hallway. Zeke jumped. Agatha looked like she was about to leave, but her father gave her a stern expression, and she sat back down. Zeke walked into the foyer, keeping his gaze on Aggie.  
“Do the homework here. We can discuss a proper punishment while I cook.” Zeke picked up the receiver and tried to hide the stress in his voice. “Howell residence.”  
“I never get used to how formal you are when you answer,” Frieda said.  
“Sorry. I’ve had a hard day. I forgot I was expecting your call,” Zeke squeezed his eyes shut in aggravation.  
“I can phone later.”  
“Don’t be silly. It’s always lovely to hear from you. How are you?”  
“Really well, actually. That tumor removal Carla was in charge of went really smoothly. The one she was worried about?”  
“Yes, I remember. That’s quite a relief.”  
“And, um, we were thinking about taking a little trip to D.C. End of next week.”  
“Really? You know I’m on my sabbatical in just a few weeks, and then I’ll be in your area for my studies.”  
“We know. It’s just that we’re going to be in town anyway, and thought we’d pay you a visit. Just for a few days. Thursday to Sunday?”  
“Um, of course! You know I’ll always put you up. And Aggie will be thrilled as always. Oh, but, next Friday is William’s birthday party. I’m sure he’d love to see you, too, if you’d like to attend.”  
“We actually have plans that night,” Frieda said, throwing him off.  
“Oh? What are you up to?”  
“Personal outing. Can’t talk about it quite yet.”  
“Alright. I’ll tell my brother you send your love.”  
“Please do. Listen, Carla’s putting dinner on the table, so I need to go, but I just wanted to tell you about the visit. I’m sorry if it’s short notice.”  
“Not a problem. You know I always love seeing both of you. And Aggie will be delighted.”  
“Zeke, you’re the best.”  
Zeke heard a click on the other end, then put the receiver back. Later on, as he discussed Aggie’s punishment with her, he decided to rope her into many household chores to let her think about what she’d done. Zeke couldn’t ground her and keep her from socializing; they both knew this.  
Aggie didn’t have any friends.  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Zeke was staying up late, something he rarely did since becoming a working father. If he could help it, that is. But he didn’t have a choice. He was finalizing the plans for his year-long sabbatical project, one that he was very excited to begin. Stonecraft Hospital, where Frieda and Carla were employed, was beginning to implement the practice of using night nurses. Many hospitals in New York had already switched to this method, and Stonecraft was slow to the uptake. Previously, the hospital hadn’t employed enough nurses to even do a test run, but now they were ready to start. Zeke intended to be one of the several night nurses employed there, and when the trial year was up, he’d write an extensive report on the subject, that, he hoped, would be praising the method.  
The college, as well as the hospital, was hesitant. Zeke had experience and education, to be certain, but they were hesitating at employing a trained doctor in a nurse’s position. Zeke had assured them he’d have no problems following orders. But they still remained skeptical. Dr. Howell was eager to do the work, however, and managed to harangue the dean enough until he said “yes.” If anything, to get Zeke off his back. Zeke wanted to make sure everything was water-tight with the project. He wanted to make that “yes” well worth the dean’s time and energy, as well as Stonecraft’s.  
He was so deep in thought that he didn’t hear his bedroom door open.  
“Papa?” Aggie said from the doorway.  
“Mm?” He looked at his sleepy-eyed daughter and smiled a little.  
Though one of her eyes had almost completely blackened due to the fight, she still looked adorable as always in her sleep-deprived state. Her auburn hair was a knotted mess, her nightgown was all rumpled, and though she often claimed she didn’t need toys anymore, still clutched Zeke’s old stuffed bear from his childhood, a ratty blue teddy named Bobo.  
“You’re still awake,” she mumbled.  
“You are, too. Supposed to be in bed, aren’t you? It’s almost midnight.”  
“I’m not tired.” She stumbled over and lay her forehead on his shoulder.  
“But I tucked you in and everything. It was the best tucking job I’d done in ages. It makes even the most wide-awake tired as the dead.”  
She gave a lazy shrug and Zeke kissed the top of her head. He wrapped his arm around her torso and gave a light squeeze.  
“I tuck you in again if you’d like. Won’t be as good as the first one, but I can try.”  
She relented, and Zeke walked her back into her bedroom, which was always a bit of a mess. Despite Agatha not really liking toys, aside from Bobo that is, she did love books and magazines. Dime novels and hardcovers littered the floor, and Zeke had nearly managed the talent of artfully stepping around them. While putting Aggie back under the covers, he found a couple more books on the comforter, and placed them on her crowded bedside table. He examined the book covers.  
“Still into magic, I see. You’ll have to show me one of your tricks sometime,” he said.  
“I showed you the one with the scarves,” she yawned.  
“Yes, and it was very good. You should practice the art of self-hypnosis. Make yourself very sleepy,” Zeke smiled.  
“That’s silly…” Aggie said, her eyelids drooping.  
Zeke kissed her forehead. “I love you. Even when I’m disappointed in you, I still love you, my darling Aggie Bea.”  
“Love you, too, Papa,” she said, then rolled over, eyes already closed.  
Zeke blew her bedside lamp off. And, sneaking his way from her bedroom, managed, miraculously, not to trip on any of the junk on the floor. Zeke instantly made a mental note; he’d have to make cleaning her room a part of the punishment.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Frieda sat up in bed, knees folded against her torso, looking over the letter again. Her chest continued to clench every time she read it. She hoped continuing to read it, to get familiar with the idea, would make her less anxious. Instead, not only was her chest tight, but now she also felt queasy.  
Carla walked back into the room, drying her hair from her bath. She watched Frieda for a moment and smiled.  
“Getting excited? Only another week and we’ll be holding her.”  
Frieda paused, considering her words. “I’m anxious.”  
Carla’s smile fell. “Oh, Honey…”  
She slid into her side of the bed, taking one of Frieda’s hands in hers, almost automatically. She and Frieda had had similar conversations in the past. It only made sense that, as the date of the adoption grew nearer, more conversations like this would pop up.  
“We don’t have to talk about it,” Frieda chuckled uncomfortably.  
“We don’t have to, but we probably should.”  
Frieda paused. “You know I’m committed, don’t you? I’m committed to you and this child we’re adopting.”  
“Of course.”  
“But I feel like we’re maybe not cut from the same cloth. I mean, you’ve always known you wanted children, but didn’t think it was a possibility. I never even considered it when I was younger.”  
“And that makes you a bad person?” Carla asked.  
“I worry it might make me a bad parent.”  
“It won’t. You’ll see. You’ll love the stuffing out of this child when you hold her for the first time.”  
“I’m sure I will, but I’m scared I’ll be too paralyzed by fear to do anything more than that.”  
“Lots of expectant parents feel this way. It’s normal to feel a little tense about a new baby. In this case, a near two-year-old.”  
“I suppose…”  
Carla kissed Frieda’s temple. “You need sleep. It’s late and you usually feel better in the morning.”  
Frieda agreed and let Carla blow out the oil lamp. Frieda put the note on her bedside table and vowed not to think about her anxiety anymore. Vow or no vow, the anxiety stayed put, and Frieda hardly slept the whole night.


	2. Chapter 2

Aggie watched from her perch in her tree as her father plodded across their little front lawn and called up to her.   
“Bea?”  
She said nothing. She knew she was still being punished.   
“I know you’re up there. I won’t make you come down, I only wanted to make sure you tidied your room. Your aunts should be here soon.”  
“Yes, sir,” Agatha muttered.   
Her father made eye contact with her through the branches, and smirked.   
“You’ll need to find a better hiding space. I always know where to find you.”   
“It’s a small house.”  
“Maybe that’s why we live here. Fewer crawl spaces for you to hide in,” Zeke said. “Roast chicken for dinner.”   
“Yummy,” she said distractedly. She was carving another set of her initials into the largest bough of the tree.   
“Well, in any case, come down soon.”  
“Do I have to put on shoes?” Agatha scratched the dirt-caked sole of her left foot.   
“No, and I won’t make you change from your britches, but do try to brush off your feet a bit before you come inside. You just cleaned those floors,” he winked.   
Zeke walked back through the front door, leaving his daughter again to her own devices. She had completed the “H” in her initials, and added two stick people and a stick bird, when the hansom cab pulled up to the curb. She watched mutely as Aunt Frieda and Aunt Carla bickered lightly about who would carry which bag. When all the luggage was unloaded from the cab, and the cabbie was paid, the horse and carriage trotted off. Carla picked up two of the bags and made for the door. Frieda took a minute, inspecting her surroundings, and almost immediately spotted Agatha in her bough.   
“Well, well, Little Miss Spy!” Frieda grinned.  
“Hello, Aunt Frieda.”  
“Hello to you, Monkey Girl. It’s been too long. Are you going to come down, or must I come up? Because, I’ll warn you, my knees aren’t what they used to be.”  
“No, I won’t torture you, old maid.”   
Frieda scowled. “Get down here before I bite your toes off.”  
Agatha slid lithely out of the tree, examining her aunt. She frowned.   
“Your hair is so short. When did you cut it?”  
Frieda tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. He hair barely reached past her chin. “A few weeks ago. I just got tired off all the maintenance. So, I chopped it off. Does it look alright?”   
“It’s great! I wish I could have short hair.”  
“Especially right now, I’d wager. It’s a godforsaken rats’ nest!” Frieda laughed, tousling her niece’s messy curls.   
Aggie wrapped her arms around her aunt’s middle and squeezed tightly. “Can you still pick me up? I bet you can’t.”  
“Bet I can.”   
Frieda kneeled down and hauled the girl onto her back. She shakily stood, Agatha’s legs in her arms, and trotted into the house.   
“Oh Lord, here comes the calvary,” Carla said from the kitchen.   
“Onward, noble steed!” Aggie called.   
Frieda made it four steps over the threshold, then let Agatha slip back onto the floor. “Like I said, your steed’s knees aren’t what they used to be.”   
Zeke emerged from the kitchen. “My Lord, Aggie. Your hair is a mess. Get upstairs and run a brush through it.”  
“Papa…”  
“Go upstairs, wash up for dinner. Clean your feet, too. I know you didn’t clean them outside.”   
Aggie was about to protest again, but her father gave her a certain expression (one that said “I don’t paddle you, but I might start”), and she began the trek up the flight of stairs.   
“She’s a dear,” Frieda said, once Aggie was out of earshot, “but she smells a little like dirt.”   
“Don’t I know it. It takes almost a full hour of bathing to get her to smell better,” Zeke sighed.   
“And how are you faring?” Frieda asked.  
“It’s been a while,” Carla added.  
“That it has. I’m the same person I’ve always been. Sleep deprived. Overworked. Thinly spread.”  
“Is this a bad time?” Frieda asked.  
“No, no. Never a bad time. It’s always nice to be in the company of other adults, for once.”   
He pulled Frieda into a warm hug, as he’d already done with her partner. “Always nice to see you too, Howell.”   
He backed out of the embrace and looked her up and down. “When did you cut your hair?”   
“Like it? It was sort of a split-second decision.”  
“She did it herself,” Carla said. “You should have seen the mess she made.”   
“It certainly suits you,” Zeke nodded.  
Frieda’s brow furrowed. “Thank you?”   
“Dinner’s in the oven, but I can put on some tea or coffee while we wait.”  
“Tea sounds lovely,” Carla said.   
Frieda settled herself at the kitchen table next to her wife and rested her hand over Carla’s. Zeke busied himself putting a kettle of water on the stove top and fetching the tea tin and cups.   
“So, letting my curiosity get the better of me, what are you two doing Friday evening? Or is it still a secret?”  
“Should we tell him?” Carla nudged Frieda’s arm.  
“It’s only fitting. I mean, we’re staying in his house.”  
Zeke eagerly sat back down at the table, in rapt attention. “Go on, then,” he said, calmly as he could.  
Carla took a deep breath, then released it, squeezing her wife’s hand. “We’re adopting a baby.”   
“She’s a toddler, really,” Frieda jumped in. “She’s almost two years. We’ve only had mail contact with this orphanage, but we’re finally going to get her on Friday.”   
Zeke’s eyes were gleaming, his smile almost too big for his face. “Oh, my goodness! Congratulations! When did all this happen?”  
“A few weeks ago. We got the letter that she needed a home, and since then we’ve just been waiting until they’d let us come get her,” Carla said.   
“Amazing. I’m so happy for you both. Do you need anything? Any help, or the like? I’m sure I have lots of Aggie’s old things stashed away somewhere.”   
“Everything’s ready back at home. Nursery’s all set up. It’s mostly been a waiting game,” Frieda said.   
“Sorry we didn’t tell you earlier, but we wanted it to be a surprise. Then we realized you might want to know if there was a potentially screaming toddler on your property,” Carla chuckled.  
“Well, not as though I don’t have experience with screaming children,” Zeke grinned. “So, does she have a name yet? Do you have one picked out?”   
“We’ve considered many different names, but I think we finally settled on Caroline. We’ll have to see if it really suits her, but…it was my grandmother’s name,” Carla said.   
“It’s a lovely name,” Zeke said, then his smile fell. “Why didn’t you tell me you were trying to become parents?”   
“We didn’t want you to worry,” Frieda said. “We were doing enough fretting for the both of us.”  
“Besides, we know your life is hectic enough as is. Adding our problems into the mix wouldn’t help anything,” Carla continued.   
Zeke stood from the table at the whistle of the kettle. After pouring the hot water into the teapot, he set the tea tray in front of his friends.   
“Well, please don’t hesitate if you need help. And I’ll be living with you for a little while anyways, so I can help out in terms of daytime care while you’re at work. I mean Agatha won’t be with us, so…”  
“It’s all worked out with your brother, then? He doesn’t mind housing her for a full year?” Carla said.  
“I suppose at this point it’s not even that big of a deal. He and Mary only have Shelley to parent at this point. It’s hardly a challenge for them taking on a second child.”  
“How does Aggie feel about it?” Frieda asked, stirring the sugar lumps into her cup.  
“She seems to be doing alright. It’ll be the longest we’ve been apart. Ever. So, it’ll be different, to say the least.”   
“You know we have room for the both of you. And we adore her; her presence would not be a burden, even with a new baby.”  
Zeke smiled wanly. “I realize. I’m trying to save her the stress of changing schools, living in a brand-new place. With me working nights, she’d hardly see me. We’d share the same room, so she wouldn’t have the amount of privacy she’s used to. But I also very well can’t make her sleep in the same room as a needy toddler. Besides, I think this time with her cousin will be good for her. She needs to be around more girls her own age.”  
“I suppose that’s all fair,” Carla said between sips.   
“What’s fair?”   
Agatha stood in the kitchen doorway; hands shoved in the pockets of her dungarees. Her face was freshly washed and her hair, despite being brushed, stuck out in all directions. The static from a fresh brushing always made it do this. Even with the now-fading shiner on her eye, she looked much more put together than she was a few minutes ago.   
“More like what isn’t fair. And that’s how cute you are. It’s not fair,” Frieda said plainly.   
“She’s even cuter when she’s bathed,” Zeke smirked, sipping his tea.   
“I’m not that dirty,” Aggie huffed.   
“You aren’t that clean, either. C’mere,” Zeke beckoned his daughter to his side. “Wanna see a magic trick?”  
“Oh, Papa…” Aggie sighed.   
He set his hand on her head, rubbed it vigorously, and then pulled his hand away. Strands of the girl’s hair stuck to his fingertips. “Tah dah!”  
“It’s static,” she sighed.  
“It’s magic!” He insisted.  
“You’re so weird, Papa.”  
“Aggie,” Carla said, “you have no idea.”   
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Zeke was standing in front of the mirror, shirtless, examining himself. It was something he usually avoided doing, as it made him feel a little self-conscious, but he somehow found himself in front of the mirror regardless. He felt the surface of his stomach. While some of his stretch marks had faded over the past eleven years, many still remained, at this point having turned white. What definitely had remained were the scars, not that he’d ever expected them to simply disappear. Though pale, the markings were still noticeable. He dragged a finger through their deep grooves. Zeke wondered if they’d ever fade but given how long it had already been since Aggie’s birth, he doubted it would happen.   
Strangely, he also wondered if he’d ever be with a woman again, and what she’d think of his scars. He found this sudden thought bizarre. Much as he had been all-consumed in his work before his marriage to Emily was arranged, he found himself in a similar boat since she had died. Even more so now with a child to raise on top of everything else. Zeke thought of himself as someone who just wasn’t cut out to be someone’s spouse. And yet, every now and then, he remembered what it was like to share a bed with another person, to talk to someone on a daily basis that didn’t have the mind of an eleven-year-old. Zeke tried to avoid spending too much time on these thoughts, as they would only remind him that he was getting older, and his window of being able to remarry was getting smaller. He’d considered remarrying just to give Aggie a mother figure. But she seemed so contented with the attention showered upon her by her three aunts, Mary included, that he let the idea slide. No, if he were to marry again, it would be on his own terms this time. He knew it wouldn’t happen, but fantasies never hurt anyone.   
A soft knock on his bedroom door jolted him from his revere. He hastily buttoned his shirt, grabbed his jacket and tie, and went to the door. Agatha stood in the hallway, wearing one of her best dresses and looking largely uncomfortable.   
“Don’t you look lovely?” Zeke said.   
“I suppose…” she grumbled.   
“Ready for me to do your hair, then?”   
“As I’ll ever be.”   
Zeke smiled at this and walked the girl back into her bedroom. He sat her down at her rarely used vanity and immediately took a brush to her hair. The sooner he could finish this task, the happier they’d both be. Taming Aggie’s hair used to be a nightmare for everyone involved, usually reducing father and daughter to an all-out screaming match. Now Agatha simply endured, though she loathed anyone touching her hair.   
Zeke quickly worked portions of her hair into a simple braid. He could feel her tensing as he did so, her nails digging into her knees.   
“Can I have hair like Aunt Frieda’s?”  
“I was wondering when you’d ask that,” Zeke smirked.  
“So, I can?”  
“Not right now. When you’re older. Say eighteen.”   
“That’s so far away!” She whined.   
“Not as far as you think. The time will fly by.”   
She huffed and tensed her body again as her father pulled her hair taut. She did think she looked a little nicer with her hair done, but she wouldn’t ever let her papa know. Then he’d style her hair every day.   
“How did you learn how to do girl hairstyles?” She knew the answer even as she asked.   
“Your mother.”  
“Why didn’t she do her own hair?” Aggie stared at the framed photograph of her mother that sat on the vanity’s table.  
“She did, for a long time. Then she got sick, and it was hard for her to do anything. So, I did her hair for her. I was very bad at it when I started, but I got better. It happens that you have hair that’s very close to how hers was. She mostly let her hair hang naturally, so I didn’t get to do it that often,” Zeke said. His voice trailed off as he plucked a ribbon from the vanity table and tied a bow at the end of the braid. He let it drape over her shoulder. “Now don’t fuss with it, or it’ll come undone. Then I’ll have to do it all over again and I know you wouldn’t want that.”   
“Why can’t I just wear some britches to the party?”  
“We’ve talked about this. Your uncle’s birthday is a nice occasion; you have to wear a dress. You think I like being in this tuxedo? I don’t, but it’s what’s expected, and sometimes you have to do things you don’t like for people you love,” Zeke muttered, tying his bowtie in the mirror.   
“I could wear a suit, too,” she grumbled. “Aunt Frieda wears britches all the time.”  
“Aunt Frieda is an adult who can make her own decisions. You are still a little lady, and thus need parental guidance to make good social choices. And right now, unfortunately, much of the world expects you to wear a dress when in a formal situation,” Zeke responded, a bit monotonously.   
They’d had this argument before. Zeke found it hard to argue for a position he didn’t believe in. If he weren’t worried about any potential consequences, Agatha could wear her overalls 24/7 and cut her hair short as she liked, as far as he cared. But he always wanted to look like an appropriate caregiver. Too many things out of place would make people notice them more. They could question Zeke’s ability as a parent. If anyone decided to do digging into Aggie’s origin, they might notice that her birth certificate wasn’t quite right. Or, that her mother’s death date was before Aggie’s birth date. In short, Zeke went to painstaking lengths to try and protect her, even if Aggie suffered a little as the consequence.   
“I promise,” Zeke sighed, “that when you are a legal adult, you can do whatever you’d like. But, until then, you just have to grit your teeth and endure.”   
“Can’t I stay here with Aunt Frieda and Aunt Carla?” Agatha said, rubbing her braid between her fingers.  
“Honey, they won’t even be here. They’re going out tonight. And Aunt Mary is dying to see you, you know that. You don’t want to hurt her feelings, do you?”  
He leaned down and kissed the top of Aggie’s head. He could sense she was working herself into a pout. He had to fix her mood, or she would be a nightmare at William’s party.   
“You can pick one book to take with you. Just one. And you can’t read it when the adults want to talk to you.”   
Aggie brightened immediately and grabbed a book off her nightstand. “Maybe I can do some magic at the party.”   
“Your uncle would love that. Take your deck of cards, too.”   
Zeke relaxed a little, beginning to think their visit might go as smooth as he hoped it would.  
\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Agatha never enjoyed Uncle William’s parties, and this one was no exception. It was lousy with adults, none of which seemed the least bit interested in talking to a child. And despite the affection her aunt had showered her with upon her arrival, Mary was too busy with other guests to do any real socializing with Aggie. So, as always, she was left to her own devices. She sat in the corner of the crowded parlor, nose deep in her newest book. “Little Women” wasn’t having the same effect on her as a Buffalo Bill dime novel usually did, but Aggie appreciated that the girls all had different personalities, Jo being her favorite. Though, she couldn’t deny, the romantic parts of the novel were still gross.   
“Hi, Aggie,” a voice said. Aggie looked up into the face of her cousin.   
“Hello, Shelley,” she said, then let her eyes drop back in the book.   
“My friends are all in my room. You should come play with us.”  
Agatha considered this. Shelley wasn’t usually this inviting; they tolerated each-other at best. There had to be a catch.  
“Why do you want me?” Aggie asked.   
“We need a 4th person to play house with us.”   
Aggie considered this for a moment, trying to weigh out the pros and cons of spending time with her cousin. They didn’t exactly get along and had vastly different personalities. But maybe this would be an opportunity for them to become friends. That would certainly make her father happy, seeing her socialize with people her own age.   
“Alright,” Aggie consented. She followed her cousin up the stairs, if not without a little hesitation. She found herself in Shelley’s room, where Shelley’s friends Alice and Emma had been waiting. Emma was cradling a dead-eyed baby doll, and Alice was tucking a different doll into a bed. Aggie, on the whole, found dolls extremely creepy. She was very reluctant to be in the same room with one, let alone touch it.   
“Emma is the mama,” Shelley explained, “Alice is the papa, and I’m one of their daughters.”   
“Who am I?” Aggie asked hesitantly. Maybe if she consented to playing the pet dog, even if it were demeaning, she wouldn’t have to play with any of Shelley’s dolls.   
“You have to be the nanny,” she said. Aggie didn’t know if she were imagining it, but she could almost see a gleam in Shelley’s eyes. She knew Agatha didn’t like dolls. Was this some kind of torture?  
“No thanks. I can just watch you play.”   
“Aggie! You have to be the nanny! Otherwise it doesn’t work!” Shelley scowled.   
“I could do a magic trick,” Aggie brightened. “I have a card trick I could teach you.”  
“No! We’re playing ‘family’ right now!” Shelley marched over to Emma, pulled the doll from her arms, and shoved it into Aggie’s face. “Just hold Rosie!”   
Aggie found herself staring down the doll she so despised. It had unfeeling, blue eyes that seemed to stare into her soul. She finally took it, holding it as far from her person as possible. “What do I even do with it?”   
The other girls all giggled like it was some big joke.   
“You rock her,” Alice said, “or change her. Or put her in the pram and go for a stroll.”   
“Why? She isn’t real.”   
“It’s pretending!” Emma scoffed.   
Rosie’s large ceramic head nodded forward, smacking itself against one of Aggie’s wrists. ‘Wretched thing,’ she thought to herself.   
“Why would I pretend that? I don’t want to be a mother.”  
“ _I’m_ the mother, _you’re_ the nanny!” Alice snapped.   
“I don’t want to be a nanny, either. Children are horrible,” Aggie said. She finally dropped the doll, Rosie’s head clunking against the soft carpeted floor.   
“But you _are_ a child!” Emma said.   
Aggie just shrugged. Shelley marched over, plucked Rosie off the floor, and dusted her off like she was badly injured. There wasn’t a scratch on her. She glared at Aggie like she had personally insulted her.   
“You’d make a terrible nanny, anyway,” Shelley said, continuing to fuss over the inanimate toy.   
Aggie couldn’t argue with that.  
“You couldn’t conjure a maternal feeling to save your life. Those are passed on from mother to daughter,” she said, looking especially smug.   
“I have a mother,” Agatha scowled. “Same as everyone else.”  
“But it’s a _learned_ trait. And I very much doubt your mother can teach you anything. Considering she’s-”  
Aggie didn’t exactly know what happened next. She blinked and Shelley was crying on the floor, holding her stomach, where she’d just been sucker punched


	3. Chapter 3

Having been left alone in the office, Frieda was free to grip Carla’s hand without restraint. Minutes ago, she had been digging her nails into the cushion of her chair. She wasn’t doing much different with Carla’s hand, really, but at least it was warm.   
“Nervous?” Carla said, a little wryly.   
“I’m trying not to be, but I haven’t been able to suppress it,” Frieda said, forcing a shaky smile.   
“You don’t have to. It’s a lot of excitement for one evening,” Carla smiled. “But, remember to keep breathing. I don’t want you to pass out.”   
Frieda couldn’t deny that she felt a little faint. She took a couple of deep breaths, but somehow felt dizzier. What if the child didn’t like her? What if she refused any affection Frieda offered? What if somehow, she didn’t give the right kind of affection in the first place? These questions and more tumbled around in Frieda’s brain, but her lips remained a tight line of anxiety.   
Carla was nervous as well, but also brimming with excited energy. She was glad she and Frieda had decided to tell Zeke about the child, because she didn’t think she could have kept her mouth shut that long. She tried to focus on her surroundings in an attempt to ground herself. The office that they were waiting in was painted a nice navy blue and had ruffled white curtains on the windows. The building was electrified, much to their surprise, and a dim light fixture hung overhead. There was a cozy fire going in the fireplace behind them, and paintings on the wall of farm scenery. Much of the books on both the desk and the shelves seemed underused, possibly more for show than anything else.   
The head of the children’s home, a plump and jolly woman whose name Carla had already forgotten, had left the room on an unnamed errand. Both women, who were previously sitting straight backed in their chairs, relaxed a little in her absence. The story they had told her, the one they’d been telling all the places they’d attempted to adopt from, was this; Carla was a widowed wife, her husband having died in a tragic attempt to cross the busy streets of New York, and Frieda was her loyal maidservant, who would presumably help her raise the child. Frieda found it a little degrading, but the story was simple enough. They didn’t hold hands, they didn’t wear their rings, and Carla tried to act mournful when she brought up her dearly departed “Alfonso,” or whatever her husband was named that day. Frieda was positive the name changed each time, swearing it had once been “Albert” or “Anthony.”   
They heard the creak of footsteps and the doorknob jiggling. Their hands snapped back to their respective armrests. Frieda tried not to hold her breath.   
“Well then,” the woman said, settling herself back at her desk. She seemed to be trying to collect herself. Carla immediately tensed. “There’s been a bit of a problem.”  
“Is the girl alright?” Carla’s words rushed out. Frieda simply paled.   
“Oh yes, she’s well and good. It’s about your application, Ms. Wilkins,” she continued. The woman had a strong Irish accent. It took a moment for Carla to digest her words.  
“Oh?”  
“Yes, erm, about it. I’m afraid we don’t adopt out to those who aren’t involved in the church.”  
Carla’s throat clenched. She swallowed her anger and grief momentarily and tried to press on. “In the correspondences, it was said everything was arranged.”  
“Yes, but it was expected you would bring some kind of proof of involvement. Not to mention a marriage certificate for you and your late husband. We may have been a wee bit more lenient on an unmarried woman if she had these papers.”   
Carla’s mouth opened and closed, her brain scrambling to find something to say.   
“Why is church involvement so important?” Frieda managed.  
The woman frowned at this and drew herself up. “The influence of Christ is very important in being a good parent. How would the child have any moral fiber otherwise?”  
“And you can afford to be so choosy with the homes? With so many orphans in your care?” Carla said, almost bitterly.  
“Ma’am, are you implying that we shouldn’t be choosy? To let our children go to neglectful homes?”   
Carla bit her tongue. She wondered if these children’s homes weren’t often more neglectful than a permanent home could be, but she said nothing.   
“Is there nothing,” Carla breathed, “I could do to convince you I’d be a good mother.”   
“It’s honestly hard to see how one of our children could be in good hands without a Catholic upbringing and a father figure. We were willing to overlook things if you had proper documentation, but seeing as you don’t, we’ll have to reject your application. If the papers do appear in the future, you may contact us again, but the girl you intended to adopt will likely be adopted by another couple.”   
“What if the documents were in a fire?” Frieda continued, seeing Carla trying to control her emotions.   
The woman sighed and leaned forward. “Ladies, if I may be frank, I’m not as gullible as you may think. I know what you’re trying to do and how it is you live. You think you’re the first Boston Marriage we’ve seen here?”   
Frieda, who was formerly pale as a dead fish, flushed bright crimson. Carla swallowed.   
“As I said, we as an institution just don’t think it’s right for a child to be raised without both parents. Father and mother. So, I’m sorry. Your application is no longer viable. And I suggest you leave now.”   
Frieda fought for the right words in her head, then Carla stood up.   
“Let’s go, Frieda.”   
She was stunned. The fight in Carla’s eyes had somehow drained completely with the last few sentences. So, Frieda wordlessly collected their coats and followed her wife outside the office, past the cavorting children in the halls, and out onto the street. Frieda tried not to think about which of the children might have been theirs. Had fate gone their way. Which it almost never did.   
The street was mostly quiet, being in a lesser populated part of D.C. Disregarding her nice outfit, Carla sat down on the edge of the sidewalk, pressing her head into her hands. Frieda stood behind her, placing Carla’s discarded coat around her shoulders. Frieda’s chest felt like a black hole, like all prior emotions had been sucked into it, leaving only a vacant space. She unconsciously gripped Carla’s shoulders.   
Carla took a shuddering breath. “I’m done.”   
“Dearest, you’re upset. Let’s go back to Zeke’s and we can-”  
“We can what?” Carla abruptly stood from the ground, wiping her face. “Regroup? Make a new plan? Contact a new orphanage? This isn’t working, Frieda! If the orphanages in New York turned us down, why should we think homes in other states would work any better?”   
“This one almost did,” Frieda sighed.  
“Until they saw us in person. They knew we were lying.”   
“Next time, we can forge a marriage certificate, or pay someone to do it for us,” Frieda said.  
“They don’t care about the papers, Frieda! They see through that! The only thing they care about is seeing a husband and wife of the church. Preferably someone with local references.”  
“We can get references. So many of our coworkers at Stonecraft love us.”   
“As doctors! They haven’t the faintest idea we’re together, and there’s no way in hell we’re telling them now,” Carla said. “They’d fire us without blinking.”  
They both knew they were running out of ideas. After two years of trying to either conceive a child or adopt one, their window of optimism seemed to be narrowing. Each felt helpless about the entire situation. It was exhausting to get a letter in the mail about a potential adoption, get their hopes up, only to be turned away at the door. Aside from abducting a local street urchin (and even those were becoming fewer and farther between, lately), Frieda and Carla had tried everything.   
Carla placed her hands on Frieda’s arms. “It’s eating me alive, pretending to be someone I’m not. Having to constantly lie this way. I feel like I’m rejecting a part of who I am.”   
“I can’t say I haven’t felt the same, dear.”   
“And you don’t take offense to my words? When I say you aren’t mine?”  
“I’ve a stronger resolve than it seems,” Frieda smiled wanly. “And you say otherwise behind closed doors.”   
She held one of Frieda’s hands and kissed it. Frieda eyed the ring on Carla’s hand. A gold band with a jade stone. Frieda’s was similar, but with a pearl center.   
“That’s a beautiful ring,” Frieda smiled. “The person who gave it to you must have loved you.”   
Carla scoffed. “Don’t let anyone tell you that you aren’t ridiculous, Frieda Asterson.”   
Frieda moved in to kiss her, but paused, realizing they were still in the open. Possibly being watched. “Let’s go,” she said.   
\----------------------------------------------------------------------  
Aggie could feel the anger radiating off of her father. She kept quiet, head down, watching her feet as they trod along the sidewalk. He’d not said a word since they left the party, except a few words of apology to her Uncle William. Aggie was tempted to gripe about the fact that they’d left before having any cake, but she was certain that would make things worse.   
“I want to know what you were thinking,” Zeke breathed, “what went through your head when you decided to attack your cousin like that.”   
She paused. She knew he didn’t really want the answer. “I wasn’t thinking.”  
“Exactly. That’s the problem; you don’t think before you act.”   
“But Shelley-”  
“Shelley may have started it,” he interrupted, “but I highly doubt she threw the first punch. Am I correct in that assumption?”   
Aggie fingered a lock of her hair. Her braid had completely come undone in the scrap. She had also torn her dress, which her father was none too pleased about as well. The first punch Aggie had landed turned into a brawl between the two girls, with all the scratching and biting that entailed. This sent Shelley’s friends crying for help. Zeke and William had to practically pull the girls apart to stop the chaos. Even after, they threw bitter words at each other, Shelley still having a few choice things to say about Agatha’s mother. William had apologized to Zeke and Aggie, assuring the both that Shelley would be punished for her actions. Zeke promised the same on Aggie’s part.   
“I am not saying what Shelley said to you was right, but I’m not saying your actions were right, either.”   
Agatha could sense her father cooling, becoming more sensible as they neared their house.   
“Am I going to be punished?”  
“Definitely,” he scowled. “But I’ll have to think of something different, seeing as you’ve cleaned the whole house. Laundry duty, perhaps.”   
Aggie didn’t know which was worse, scrubbing the floors or scrubbing the linens. She swallowed her commentary, knowing any input might make the punishment worse.   
“Now, when we get home, you’re going straight to bed. Even if your aunts are already home, you can see them tomorrow.”  
“It’s not even eight,” Aggie whined, in spite of herself.  
“Well, I’m sorry, but children who pick fights don’t get to negotiate their bedtimes.”   
Zeke opened the front gate, and father and daughter plodded across the small lawn, up onto the stoop, and into the house. Aggie stomped through the hallway and sulked up the stairs. Zeke was so focused on his daughter, he walked right past the sitting room, only to back up and peek inside. He found Carla and Frieda slumped on one of the sofas, sipping on what appeared to be brandy.  
“Where did you get that?” He raised his brow. “You didn’t find it under my roof, I hope.”  
“We stopped at a market on the way back,” Carla said. Her voice was choked and tired.  
“Didn’t want to come back entirely empty handed…” Frieda released a sardonic laugh. She quickly downed the rest of her glass.   
At once, Zeke understood, and felt his chest sinking in on itself. “You didn’t…I thought…”  
“Yes, well,” Frieda said. Her throat was tight. She poured herself another glass.   
They heard crashing noises from the floor above them. Zeke eyed the staircase, then his friends again. “I need to handle a situation with my daughter, but I’ll be back down in a moment, alright?”  
“Do what you need to do,” Carla smiled tiredly, “We’ll be here.”   
Zeke hurried up the flight of stairs and straight to his daughter’s room. She had slammed the door shut, and he quickly opened it again. Aggie was busy throwing her various possessions against the wall. It started with her shoes, now it was books, pillows, anything she could get her hands on.   
“Young lady!” Zeke snapped. “What in blazes do you think you’re doing?”  
“Get out!”   
“I won’t leave you in such a state!”  
“Leave me alone!”  
She aimed another shoe at her father’s head, and he ducked just in time. It hit a picture frame in the hallway, which fell off the wall and splintered with a crash. Zeke’s countenance darkened, and Aggie’s paled in return. Zeke closed his eyes and took a deep breath.   
“Get in your bedclothes. Then pick up this mess and get in bed,” he said calmly. But there was a latent anger brewing underneath.   
Agatha pointed weakly to the hallway. “But-”  
“I’ll get the shoe and clean up the frame. I don’t want you to get hurt.”   
Once he was certain she’d do as she was told, he went to the hall closet for the dustpan and broom. To his relief, the frame that broke didn’t hold anything important, just a decorative landscape scene. He quickly swept up the glass and fetched his daughter’s shoe. Rejoining Aggie in her room, he found her in the middle of cleaning up the damage. Once it was a passable attempt, Aggie slid into bed. Zeke sighed and sat down on the side of her bed. He breathed deeply, folding his hands.  
“You need to find a better outlet for your anger. You have a lot of it, and other people’s commentary about you isn’t going to get nicer,” Zeke said.  
“I hate people,” she said, her words muffled by her pillow.   
“I was also quite hostile at your age. You won’t always feel that way.”  
“I will! My whole life, I’ll hate people.”   
“Even me and your aunts?”  
Aggie considered this, “Except you and Aunt Frieda and Aunt Carla.”   
“I see. Your uncle will be very sad.”   
“I don’t hate Uncle William or Aunt Mary,” she pulled her face away from the pillow. “But I hate everyone else.”  
“That’s a lot of people.”  
“I don’t care,” she said, but paused and added, “Are you mad at me?”  
Zeke sighed, “A little. I don’t like you damaging your nice things, and I certainly don’t like you attacking your family members.”  
“I don’t like what Shelley says about me.”  
“I can’t control what she says or doesn’t say, nor can I control how William raises her. But I realize you’re sensitive about your mother not being with us.”  
Aggie didn’t react to this.  
“It upsets you, I’m not naïve.”   
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said firmly.   
Zeke felt his chest sink. “Are you sure?”  
She didn’t respond. Zeke saw that she was holding back anger-fueled tears. After a few more minutes of silence, he kissed Aggie’s forehead, bade her goodnight, and quit the room. Once alone in the hall, he breathed out the tension he’d been containing. He wished like anything Agatha would just talk to him. But as she aged, they were communicating less and less, and arguing more and more. He was convinced she was picking fights just to anger him.   
Zeke forced himself to let it go, for the time being, and descend the stairs to the sitting room. There was no door to the room, but he was fairly sure Aggie couldn’t hear any of their conversation from her bedroom.   
“What happened?” Frieda asked, sensing his tension.   
“Picked a fight with her cousin. At William’s birthday party, no less,” he smiled tensely.   
He settled in an armchair that faced the sofa Carla and Frieda were sitting on. Zeke tried very hard to ignore the decanter of brandy that sat on the coffee table. There were so many moments in raising Aggie that Zeke wished more than anything he could drink, this one included, but having been sober for several years, he didn’t intend to ruin that streak.   
“So,” he finally said, clearing his throat, “things…didn’t work out?”   
“That’s the short of it,” Carla said.   
“What’s the long of it?”   
“Adoption facilities are bending the rules to suit their needs,” Frieda said. “They’re needing more and more paperwork to prove we’d be a good home. What it really boils down to is that they want proof of a church-going, man and wife couple.”   
“Do you tell them that you’re together?”  
“Of course not,” Carla scoffed. “Our ‘story’ is that I’m a widow and she’s my maidservant.”   
Zeke tried not to chuckle, but it was funny to think about Frieda doing any kind of household chore whatsoever. If it weren’t for Carla’s pestering, she would likely live in chaos.   
“The director of the orphanage, well, she knew we were married. Somehow. If not romantically, at least in the Boston marriage sense,” Frieda continued.   
“Could she have you arrested?” Zeke asked, brow furrowed in worry.  
“We’re not sure. We’ve been scared to pursue things further. If they say ‘no,’ we take them at their word,” Frieda paused, then said, “Was it this hard for you and Emily when you were trying to adopt?”  
Zeke considered this. “It was hard for a different reason, putting out ads and waiting for someone to respond. The waiting was quite painful, the loss was worse. I suppose in some ways the new system is better, but the anonymity is gone.”   
Carla took another long swig of her drink, and Frieda followed suit. Zeke looked at their red eyes and tearstained faces, and his heart ached.   
“Look, I don’t want to intrude on your relationship, but I could help you somehow. Have either of you tried conceiving?”  
“Of course,” Carla said. “That’s what we tried first. We stole sperm samples from the hospital and made several attempts to conceive.” Carla sighed, like holding that secret had been painful.   
Zeke’s eyebrows raised, but he made no commentary.  
“It didn’t work. I’m going through early menopause, and Frieda…well, we actually don’t know why she can’t get pregnant, but it hasn’t worked.”  
“I believe I have a strangely shaped uterus,” Frieda added. “But it’s just a theory. I read that it may be one reason why a young woman can’t conceive.”   
“So, we stopped trying, and focused more on adoption. We’ve come close, but ultimately we keep getting turned down,” Carla said.  
“Would you need a man to pose as your husband?” Zeke offered. It was a casual offer, almost joking, but he meant it.  
“Thank you, but we’re not sure if the paperwork would be more important to the orphanages. We wouldn’t want to waste your time,” Frieda said.  
Zeke breathed, then said, “What if it was more…official? In all honesty, the likelihood that I’d ever marry again, for love or otherwise, is quite slim. I might as well help someone.”   
Frieda thought about this. She always knew, if not vaguely, that Zeke would be willing marry one of them for legal purposes, but this was the first time he’d said it aloud in their years as friends. She felt both flattered, loved, and uncomfortable. She saw as Carla’s smile waned, and her own mouth formed a tight line.   
“We couldn’t ask you to do that for us,” Carla said.  
“You don’t have to. I’m offering. I’d never ask anything in return, but if you feel you’d need help,” he paused, then said, “I know what it’s like to want a child that badly. Possibly more than anyone. I don’t want to see you struggle the way I did.”  
“Zeke, you’re one of our closest friends, and this is beyond generous, but…” Frieda tried to find the kindest way to turn him down.  
“What if you found somebody?” Carla asked.  
Zeke scoffed at this comment. “I haven’t courted anyone since my wife’s death. Being a widower with a child doesn’t make for good prospects.”   
‘Not that I’ve been looking,’ Zeke thought to himself.  
“But say you did find someone, what happens then? Wouldn’t it be hard to dissolve the marriage without legal complications with the child we’d adopt?”  
“Besides, you’d practically have to live with us to make the adoption work. They’d check in on the child from time to time. And I realize we’re friends, but I’m not sure I could share a house with you,” Frieda said bluntly.   
“I hadn’t considered that. And aside from the upcoming sabbatical, I have no intention to live in New York longer than I have to, for Aggie’s sake,” Zeke said. “I suppose it wouldn’t work after all.”   
Zeke was kicking himself. He felt as though he was going back on a promise that he’d never even made. He wracked his brain for other solutions.   
“Listen, I’d not usually consider such an extreme measure, but hospitals see a lot of children that are abandoned by their parents,” Zeke said. “Have you ever thought of-”  
“Yes,” Carla said, her voice pained. “But I’m not sure I could live with myself. I once tried to take an abandoned infant, but I couldn’t go through with it.” She sniffed back another round of tears.   
“Sometimes the mother comes back. It’s such a complicated system,” Frieda said, holding her wife’s hand.   
“It’d be so much easier if one of us could conceive, but,” Carla swallowed, wiping her face, “as we said, that hasn’t worked.”   
Zeke folded his hands under his chin, forcing himself to look at his friends instead of the liquor on the table. “Why have you never told me about all of this? Especially if you’ve been trying for several years!”  
“Well frankly, how could you have helped?” Carla asked.  
“I haven’t a notion, but perhaps you wouldn’t have felt so alone.”   
A somber silence fell over the room. The air of mourning surrounded them like a fog. Carla stopped drinking after three glasses, with Frieda continuing to sip on her fourth one, but with no enthusiasm. She just didn’t want to feel the ache anymore. That hollow emptiness of loss. She’d felt it before, and frequently, with each child they’d been denied. She knew whatever she was feeling, Carla felt it even worse. Their desire for a child was imbalanced, as Frieda more wanted Carla to be happy, and to see her so upset was wretched. She wanted to fold into her wife’s arms, the two of them together in their bed, and never leave. But the world kept turning all the same, as if just to spite her.   
Zeke eyed the clock that stood against the wall and cleared his throat. “I think I shall retire for the evening. Stay up as long as you’d like, help yourself to anything in the pantry. Know that I care very deeply for the both of you, and that I’ll keep mulling over a solution.”  
Carla smiled softly, out of kindness as opposed to actually believing he could fix things. “Thank you, Zeke. The feeling is mutual, and as always you’re a lovely host.”   
Frieda also gave a smile, brief as it was, but was too tired to think of any parting remarks. Zeke turned away from his friends and ascended the stairs.   
\------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Zeke hadn’t looked at the clock, but it was easily three in the morning. He had been sleeping, if rather lightly, up until that point, but was at once wide awake for no discernible reason. His dreams were usually the cause of such an awakening, but he didn’t remember any dream being particularly impressionable. With the striking of a match, he lit his bedside lamp, turning it up until the room filled with a deep orange glow. Zeke piled his pillows behind him and leaned back in repose. He immediately remembered the conversation he and his friends shared earlier. His heart ached for them. At once, his thoughts were swimming and tried to pick them apart in the fray.   
‘I could carry a child for them,’ one thought said.   
Zeke chuckled and tried to shrug it off. But the idea stuck and started to nag him.   
‘You’ve done it once before.’  
‘Aggie is perfectly healthy. What’s to say a second child wouldn’t be the same?’  
‘The gestation wasn’t easy, but wasn’t the outcome worth it?’   
He shoved his head against the pillows and tried to fall back asleep. It didn’t work; he was more awake than ever. Zeke jerked back up and began rifling through his bedside drawer. At the bottom, under various junk items, was his journal. _The_ journal. It had certainly been a while. It was covered in dust, and as Zeke shook it out, particles danced in the lamplight. He flipped through the stained pages, examining his own illustrations and horrid handwriting.   
Peeking down his nightshirt, he regarded his various scars and stretch marks. A lot of the latter had faded over time, but the scars were still stark as ever. Zeke wondered if he wasn’t too old to even be considering this. He was a few years older than Carla, and she was already experiencing menopause. Zeke himself already had some grey patches in his thinning orange locks. But he couldn’t help thinking of all the ways medicine had advanced in the years since Aggie’s birth. Caesareans weren’t as uncommon as they used to be. The baby could be delivered at Stonecraft, where Frieda and Carla worked, a fully stocked medical facility. Besides, he’d be living with them during his year-long sabbatical. He could work at the hospital as a night nurse and carry the child at the same time.  
He stopped himself. Was he really considering this? He wanted to be certain before even talking about it with his friends. Something was making him hesitate, but a stronger thought was pushing those feelings aside.  
‘They helped you, didn’t they?’  
That did it. He pushed himself out of the bed, clutching the journal, and rushed into the hallway. Zeke knocked firmly on the guestroom door. He heard hushed talking, then tired footsteps. The door opened. A sleep-drunk Carla peered through the crack.   
“Zeke? Have you any idea the time?”  
“I’m aware. And I apologize. But this couldn’t wait,” Zeke said, trying to suppress his energy.  
Carla thought for a moment, blinking slowly, then opened the door. “Entrez-vous,” she yawned.   
“I think I’ve found a solution to your baby problem,” he said, pacing across the rug.   
Frieda sat up in bed, Carla stood a little straighter, both more awake. He had their attention.   
“Alright,” Frieda said. “Let’s have it, then.”  
Zeke breathed deeply, then said, “I’ll conceive and carry the child for you.”


	4. Chapter 4

“No! No, no, no, no!” Frieda said. The words flew out of her mouth almost immediately after Zeke finished his sentence.   
“I assumed this would be your reaction. Let me explain,” Zeke said, calm as ever. He tried to maintain a low volume, terrified of waking his daughter in the other room.   
“What part of ‘no’ is lost on you? I refuse. Both of us refuse,” she hissed.   
Frieda looked at her wife, who was leaning against the wall. Carla’s eyes fell.   
“Listen, please. I’ve been awake for a while contemplating it. I’ll be living with you for a full year starting in June. We can try conceiving over the summer. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, but it’s something you haven’t tried yet,” Zeke said.   
“Because we would never ask this of you!”  
“We couldn’t expect you to do something like this,” Carla said, though less convincingly than her wife. “You had such a hard time carrying Aggie.”  
“You’re not asking me, I’m offering,” Zeke said. “I can’t stop thinking about it, and I wouldn’t be offering if I weren’t completely sure I could go through it again.”  
“What about what we went through?” Frieda hissed. “How sick you were? Do you understand how hard it was for us when we thought you were dying?”  
“Yes, it was difficult, but we learned so much from it. And there have been so many different medical advancements made over the past eleven years. A hospital delivery would be more ideal for this gestation.”  
“This ge…Zeke, you’re not listening to me. We don’t agree to this. Right, Carla?”  
They both looked at Carla, who was idly fiddling with her braid. She bit her lip. “Well…”  
Frieda’s glare darkened.  
“He is offering, dearest. It really couldn’t hurt anything to try and-”  
But Frieda had jumped up from the bed, brushed past her friend and her spouse, and marched downstairs. Zeke and Carla heard the front door open and close. Carla sighed, massaging her forehead.   
“I hadn’t meant to cause any trouble.”   
“It’s not you. Frieda’s been having a lot of reservations about becoming a parent. That aside, I’m certain if anything happened to you, and she was more or less responsible, she’d never recover,” Carla said.   
“So, she’s running away?” Zeke almost laughed.  
“No, no. She’s getting some air. She does that when she’s in a huff.”  
“I suppose I got a little manic. I can get swept away once an idea grabs me,” Zeke sighed. “What do you think?”  
Carla breathed for a moment, trying to think through the haze of sleep. She walked over and sat on the end of the bed. “I think it would be risky, but it might work. I just can hardly believe you’d want to go through it again.”  
“Admittedly, I did swear childbearing off after what I endured carrying Agatha, but I realized I’d do it again for someone else. Specifically, the both of you.”  
Carla filtered through her thoughts, and after a minute, said, “We can try it, at least. It’s not like she and I have been getting anywhere doing the same things several times over. That being said, I won’t agree to it unless she does.”   
“Do you think you can talk to her?”   
“We should probably all talk together, but I can’t leave her outside.”  
“Let me go outside and see how she’s doing. I clearly touched a nerve,” Zeke said. “I’ll at least see if I can get her to come back inside.”  
“Best of luck. I’m going to let her have space, so she doesn’t start fighting with me, too,” Carla sighed.  
“Fair enough,” Zeke chuckled.   
Carla settled herself back on her side of the guest bed, dimming the bedside lamp, and Zeke quit the room. He took a small oil lamp from the hallway table and lit it. Glowed dimly, and didn’t provide a large amount of light, but it would help Zeke not to trip down the stairs. As quietly as possible, praying he hadn’t already awoken his snoozing daughter, he crept down to the first floor and out the front door. The night was warmer than he expected, and the darkness was more encompassing. The street was quiet and still. Not even a cricket chirp.   
Frieda was sitting on the porch steps, her head in her hands. Zeke set the lamp on one of the wooden porch’s railings and settled next to his friend.   
“I’m sorry,” he began. “I hadn’t meant to drop this on you so suddenly. And in the middle of the night.”   
“When have you ever acted differently?”   
Zeke could hear the smirk in her voice and relaxed a little. “I suppose it was a rather rushed idea. But we’ve done it before, so all we’d have to do is a repeat trial. I have all the notes and research we did the last time.”  
“You do realize it’s far too early in the morning for me to process this, don’t you?”   
“My apologies,” Zeke said. “May I ask what you’re thinking right now?”  
“I’m thinking that you’re just as insane as when I worked for you.”   
Zeke laughed.   
“I’ve also been wondering where you’d find the egg,” Frieda added. “You could try to extract one of mine or Carla’s, but that’d probably be near impossible without abdominal surgery.”   
He considered this. When he’d conceived Agatha, he’d had his late wife’s ovaries, and thus her eggs to work with. But he knew he didn’t have them anymore. They’d have to use an anonymous woman’s egg.  
“Perhaps Stonecraft? Hysterectomies take place every day,” he said.  
Frieda looked at him incredulously. “You mean steal one?”   
“You stole sperm samples. Besides, what choice would we have? As you said, it’d be near impossible to procure one of yours or your spouses.”   
“You do understand that if anyone of our superiors finds out, Carla and I are going to jail. At the very least we’ll be fired,” she said sternly.   
“We can do it without getting discovered. No one figured it out last time.”  
“Montgomery did.”  
“Otto was a fluke. He had it out for me. And he stole my notes. Besides, we won’t be tracking and presenting any research this time. It will be easier to keep it a secret. No notes, no paper trail.”  
“Still, you have a job, now. You can’t hide away at home when you gain the weight,” Frieda said.   
“I still have all the clothing from my first pregnancy. Baggier clothing could help.”  
Frieda breathed. “It’s one thing for you to do this for yourself, it’s another that you’d do this for Carla and me. If anything happened to you…” she said but didn’t continue.  
“I am ultimately the one who is choosing to do this. Anything that happens would be my own fault.”  
“And what will you tell Aggie?” Frieda scowled.  
His words paused at the back of his throat. “Aggie will be living with William for the full year. I may visit once, but I’ll make sure it happens before the third trimester. As far as she’s concerned, this never happened.”   
“She still doesn’t know, does she?”   
Zeke frowned in irritation. “I’ve promised myself she’ll know everything when she turns eighteen. Besides, what would you tell your own child?”  
“They’re adopted. It’s an easy story.”  
“What if he or she looks like me?”  
“Please, god forbid!” Frieda smirked.   
“We know it’s a possibility,” Zeke said. “Listen, Frieda, I know your hesitant, but you must know how much empathy I feel for the both of you. I remember so clearly that strong desire to be a parent. I never wanted anyone to feel that kind of helpless wanting. You’ve tried all avenues and you’ve hit a dead end. Let me help you.”  
Her smile fell as she remembered what they were discussing. “Zeke, I need time to think about this. It’s an incredibly generous offer, but there’s so much on the line.”   
“I assumed you’d need a while to process everything,” he nodded.  
“Would we pay you?” Frieda blurted out.  
Zeke laughed. “Absolutely not. I’ll already be staying with you during the sabbatical. I don’t need any monetary compensation. You know Aggie and I are more than well off.”  
Frieda sighed, and said, “Give me until Monday. I’ll have an answer for you then.”   
“That’s the day you’re leaving,” he said. “I have a class that afternoon. Would you mind telling me before I leave? Or leaving a note?”  
Frieda nodded. “You wouldn’t do this without my permission, right?”  
“No, no, no. Perish the thought. I certainly don’t intend to raise a second child, so you and Carla must agree to take the baby.”  
“Carla…oh god. She’s already sold on the idea, isn’t she?” Frieda groaned.  
“Possibly,” he admitted.   
“I’m not sure I have the energy to commit to anything tonight,” Frieda said.   
She was almost as tired as Zeke was awake. She watched the grass shudder in the evening breeze. It being April, there was a still a slight chill in the air that was absent during the day. Frieda rubbed her arms to quell her goosebumps. Feeling her eyes droop from lack of sleep, she finally stood up and brushed off her nightdress.   
“Tomorrow then?” Zeke said, following suit. “I’ll make an apology breakfast.”  
“Pancakes? There’d better be pancakes.”  
“I’ll make it so. You’ve just made Aggie very happy.”  
\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
In the few days that followed, Frieda avoided any and all conversation about babies and parenting, from Carla or Zeke. She promised she was thinking about Zeke’s offer, but a part of her was also trying not to. She threw herself into spending more time with Aggie and relaxing where possible. She knew she’d have to go back to work as soon as she returned to New York, so she wanted to make her time off count. On the Sunday before they’d depart, she sprung the idea of visiting the D.C. zoo. Despite Agatha still being punished for her behavior at her uncle’s party, Zeke agreed that they could all go. He couldn’t deny how nice the spring day was, and he had a bit of an itch to go outside.   
Because Zeke was having to keep up with Aggie, who was extremely rambunctious given how thrilled she was to be on an outing, Carla and Frieda were given plenty of time to hang back and be alone. This was the opposite of what Frieda expected to happen. Carla, much like the lions they had just been observing, was ready to pounce on the opportunity for conversation. It happened in the monkey house, as they were watching a mother chimp nursing her baby. She had just given birth this week.  
Because of course she had.  
“Isn’t that sweet?” Carla asked.   
“Mmm,” Frieda answered begrudgingly.   
“You do realize we can’t avoid this conversation forever?”  
“Don’t tempt me,” she smirked.   
“Sweetheart, what other options do we have?”  
“We could get a dog,” Frieda offered, mostly joking. Carla scowled. She stopped smiling.  
“Do you not want a baby?”  
“I do, I do! Of course, I want a baby with you. It’s just that I hadn’t really expected Zeke to be the one to carry it,” she sighed.  
“Well, if he thinks he can do it, maybe we should let him.”  
“He thinks he can do lots of things,” she said flatly.  
The couple began wandering out of the monkey house and into the bright sunshine. Frieda squinted in the glare and walked over to the large pond that held various exotic waterfowl. A mother harlequin duck paddled her ducklings around in the water.   
‘Has every animal reproduced this week? This is getting ridiculous,’ Frieda thought.   
“Look, he just wants to try to conceive. If it doesn’t work, that’s the end of that,” Carla continued as if they hadn’t moved.  
“It will work. You know it will.”  
“Then we get to be mothers!”  
“What if Zeke comes to harm because of the pregnancy?”  
“He knows he’s taking that risk,” Carla said.  
“But this time, it’s our child. I couldn’t live with that guilt.”  
“And what if everything goes fine and you’ve worried your little head off for nothing?”   
“That rarely happens,” she said, leaning her hands on the railing of the pond.   
Carla reached out and rubbed Frieda’s shoulder. She tucked one of Frieda’s rascally blonde hairs behind her ear. Frieda looked out across the pond and saw Zeke and Aggie, who were also watching the ducks. Aggie glanced up and gave her a wave, which she reciprocated with a small smile. Frieda sometimes wished her child could be a duplication of Agatha Howell. She loved her so much, she could have been mistaken for her mother. Many times, Frieda had been tempted to pick up and move to Washington, just to be closer to her and her father. But she and Carla had made such a great life for themselves, Frieda wouldn’t dare uproot them.   
“The first gestation was incredibly complicated,” Carla continued abruptly. “I can’t for the life of me see why he’d want to go through it again. But he’s offering up something so incredibly generous, and he seems dead set on helping us one way or another.”  
“It doesn’t mean we should consent.”  
Carla’s countenance fell. “Darling, we’ve tried everything else. We might have to face facts and realize this is our only option left.”  
Frieda’s stomach sank. She knew Carla was right, but at the same time she was stubborn. This felt like admitting defeat. But Frieda herself had been wracking her brain all week, trying desperately to think of another route. Aside from her or Carla trying to impregnate themselves again, which clearly hadn’t worked in the past, Frieda could think of nothing else. Perhaps this really was their only way to become mothers. And a deep part of her still wanted that. So badly.   
Her shoulders slumped. She crossed her arms defensively across her chest. “I’ll talk to him. Figure out the logistics.”  
Carla gave her a small smile. “It doesn’t hurt to make an attempt.”  
She nodded. Frieda tried to keep the mindset that this would just be a trial. Maybe Zeke wouldn’t be able to conceive a second time. Though she highly doubted it. He was just stubborn enough to make it happen.   
Carla paused, and smirked. “A little ironic, isn’t it? Two women asking a man to carry their child?”   
Frieda didn’t talk again for the rest of the day.   
\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
The attic was covered in dust, as was to be expected, really. Neither Zeke nor Agatha ever went up there. It housed nothing of any real interest, anyways. Old nursery furniture, dolls gifted by Aunt Mary that Agatha never touched, and stacks of Emily’s books that Zeke never used. The first thing Zeke did was open a window. However, the light breeze didn’t seem to permeate the attic space, which kept the room feeling stuffy. Zeke rolled up his shirt sleeves and gave the attic a quick once-over. He spotted what he needed almost immediately. A large trunk with a padlock on the front.   
Zeke knew that the big trip to New York wasn’t for a few more weeks, but he wanted to get started on packing. He also had to find one of his other trunks, to get Aggie packed to stay with William. If anything, he was more eager to get a head start on her packing. She would procrastinate the most. Zeke fished the padlock key out of his pocket and unlocked it with a satisfying “clack!” Throwing open the lid, his heart fluttered in his chest.   
All of his old maternity outfits were folded neatly at the bottom. Most of the clothing was still in good condition, but a few of the outfits had vomit stains on them, from Aggie’s infancy. Some of her baby outfits were in their as well. Zeke marveled at how tiny they were. The stocky, almost teenage girl off at school couldn’t possibly be the same person. But she was! Zeke’s chest clenched a little, trying not to think about being so far away from her for a full year. He gathered up the baby clothes and decided to store them elsewhere. He left his old clothes lining the bottom of the chest.   
Though awkwardly, he managed to move the cumbersome trunk from the attic and back into his bedroom. He began going through his drawers in search of things he could pack ahead of time.   
“How’s it going?” Frieda asked from the doorway.  
Zeke was pleasantly surprised to be in her company again. She’d been avoiding him all week.   
“Fine. Just doing a bit of packing.”  
Frieda raised an eyebrow. “The trip’s not until early June, you realize?”   
“Yes, yes. But if I get a little of my own stuff done, I don’t have to rush when Agatha waits to pack until the last minute,” he laughed.   
“William doesn’t live that far away. Her forgetting something wouldn’t be the end of the world.”  
He pulled several pairs of socks from a drawer and tossed them into the trunk. “Still, I’m trying to avoid the conflict all the same. Besides, if I pack now, it will be less for me to do during the time of my students’ finals.”   
Frieda walked over to Zeke’s bed and sat on the edge. “We should talk.”  
“Yes. Seems you’ve been avoiding me,” Zeke said with an edge of humor. He leaned against the bedpost closest to Frieda.   
“You noticed?”  
“I’m an observant man,” he smirked.   
“Well, you’ve offered something incredible and ludicrous at the same time. And you meant it. Without even much thought. So, somebody has to do the thinking around here!” Frieda seemed to be experiencing a combination of disbelief and seething anger. Zeke kept his distance.   
“Of course, I meant it. But it’s just an offer. You don’t have to say ‘yes.’”   
“Zeke, I’m caught between a rock and a hard place. A large part of me would never let you put yourself through that again! Especially at my expense,” Frieda’s voice wavered.   
“Understandable.”  
“But,” her breath shuddered, “Carla and I want to be parents so badly. And, that’s clouding my judgement.”   
Zeke frowned. He wanted to emphasize that he’d survived the first gestation, but he knew it was only by the skin of his teeth. “Frieda, I can’t possibly make this decision for you.”   
“I realize. Zeke, what you’ve asked of me, I’m not sure I can deal with it emotionally. It hasn’t even happened yet and I’m already a nervous wreck. Compounding that anxiety with my usual stress about becoming a parent, and I can hardly think straight.”   
Zeke’s throat tightened with guilt. He certainly knew this anxiety. He’d wrestled with it so much during the conception and gestation of Aggie. Hell, he’d had anxieties just planning the experiment. Carrying it to fruition fried his nerves.   
“And yet,” Frieda sighed, clinching her eyes shut. “Carla and I have agreed that we want you to at least try.”  
Zeke’s eyes lifted in surprise. “Really?”  
“If the offer still stands, of course,” she said. “And if you can’t conceive during the time of your visit, then we scrap the idea.”   
Zeke thought for a moment, then nodded resolutely. “Alright. We’ll give it a try.”   
Frieda breathed, massaging her forehead. “I cannot believe I’ve agreed to this.”   
“I believe you said something very similar twelve years ago,” he laughed.   
“And, truly, I still can’t believe it,” she said, but smiled. She peered down into the deep trunk. “Are those your old maternity outfits?”  
Zeke flushed. “I’ll need something to wear in the later months. I would like to avoid having to buy a whole new wardrobe. Again.”   
Frieda picked up one of the shirts and examined it. “I forgot you got that big.”  
Zeke glared and snatched the shirt from her hands. He huffed, carefully refolded the shirt, and placed it back in the trunk. Frieda’s face fell again.   
“You really want to go through it again? Just to help us?”   
“Absolutely,” Zeke said, without any hint of hesitation. “I am more than happy to be able to help you. To return the favor, as it were.”   
“Well, that’s…” Frieda eyed the clock on the wall and abruptly jumped to her feet. “Oh, blast it! I need to help Carla get our things together.”  
“When does your train depart?”   
“Noon. And it’s already ten. When’s your class?”   
“Twelve-thirty. I apologize that I won’t be able to see you off.”   
“We’re doctors. I think we can find the train station ourselves,” she grinned. “We’ll be in touch, then.”  
“At least telephone when you’re back home. That would put me at ease.”   
“Whatever helps soothe that frazzled head of yours,” Frieda said, pulling her friend into a tight hug. “I suppose I won’t be seeing you again until June.”  
“Yes, and I need to keep packing.”  
Frieda rolled her eyes and quit the room. Zeke quickly added a waistcoat and jacket to his outfit, in preparation for his class. He hesitated at the door, feeling like he was forgetting something. Finally, he walked over to his bedside table and pulled his journal from the drawer. Zeke briefly flipped through its tattered pages before tossing it into the trunk.


	5. Chapter 5

(Flashback)  
Aggie blinked in surprise as a trickle of water streamed down the side of her face. She let out a sound that, through Zeke’s self-conscious filter, sounded annoyed.   
“Sorry,” he muttered, using the soapy washcloth to dab at the side of her cheek.   
He glanced sideways at the kitchen clock. Almost one in the morning. He hadn’t meant to be up this late bathing his six-month-old, but sometimes it was the only way to get her to stop crying. And, boy, had she been howling. Zeke didn’t blame the poor kid. Being suddenly uprooted from the house and bedroom you’ve known literally since birth, on a loud and confusing several-day train ride, to a new house in a new city mustn’t be easy. Aggie wasn’t used to living next to a busy road, so the noise of traffic bothered her. She and Zeke had only lived there two weeks, and the sounds carriages and pedestrians were still new and upsetting to little Aggie. They weren’t too much trouble after dark, but any sudden noise from the street could startle her awake.   
Almost the entire fortnight had been sleepless for the father and daughter. At some point, Zeke didn’t remember when he’d figured it out, he learned that Aggie loved baths. The warm water soothed her and usually put her to sleep by the time she was toweled off. Besides, anything that kept her clean was a plus in Zeke’s book.   
“I hadn’t realized this move would be so harrowing for you,” Zeke said, using another handful of water to wash the soap from the baby’s hair. “I suppose that’s my fault.”   
Despite Agatha’s crying spells, Zeke didn’t regret the move. He appreciated her nursery still being by his bedroom, and it was much less of a hassle getting to the first floor from the second. It was also easier to clean, not that he’d had much time to do so recently. Zeke rested easier, more or less given Aggie’s sleep habits, knowing that William lived nearby. He and Mary had already offered to take the baby for a night or two. Aside from Zeke’s initial stubbornness, he wanted to save this request for when he really needed it. Though he wasn’t sure he’d admit it when he needed it. But he had come close a couple of times.   
It was moments like this, however, that made him never want to let Aggie out of his sight. The moments where she was perfectly content, where she’d smile and even giggle, if he were lucky. When Zeke felt like he could sit for hours on end and just watch his daughter. Watch her mind work and her face cycle through a series of miniscule emotions during the span of a single minute. A scholar studying his subject. Sometimes he’d stay up a little later just to lean against the cradle and watch Agatha sleep. Her legs liked to kick when she was dreaming. The things he found completely entrancing about his child, other people found mundane. He’d often try to describe things that Aggie could do, that he thought were amazing, leaving the other person feigning interest.   
And Aggie wasn’t exactly helpful. When she was alone with Zeke, or someone else she knew, she was all smiles. But she would never, not once, smile at a stranger. And unfortunately, little Aggie’s resting expression always looked angry. It was the way her face squished when it was still. It made it so that she’d grimace at everyone, whether they deserved it or not. Zeke had even taken her to have a baby picture made. Not so much as a smirk. Zeke bought the photo regardless, and now had a daguerreotype of a very grumpy infant on his mantel. He’d even attempted to draw a picture of the infant. But it was hard to draw a squirming subject, and he didn’t exactly want a portrait of her asleep.   
“Someday,” he said, “I’ll have a picture of you smiling. When you least expect it.”   
Aggie burbled some attempt at speech and tried to grab the soap bar. Zeke scooted it just out of her grasp. Seeing to make sure she was as clean as she could possibly be, Zeke pulled the plug from the sink drain, and scooped Aggie into a towel. As he dried her head, little strands of her ginger hair stood on end. She butted her head against Zeke’s chest, creating a large damp splotch under the collar.   
Zeke sighed. “Well, I was about to get in a nightshirt, anyways.”   
The baby fidgeted in his arms as Zeke carried her upstairs, her eyes darting to look at every little thing in her sight. Finally, she leaned forward against Zeke’s shoulder and began gumming on his shirt.   
“Lovely,” Zeke said, cringing inwardly.   
In the nursery, Zeke laid Agatha down on the changing table, then lit a nearby lamp. He covered the infant in a fine dusting of talcum powder, which always made her sneeze, and folded her into a new diaper.   
“Consider yourself clean,” Zeke smiled.   
Agatha shoved her left foot into her mouth.  
“Well, most of you, anyway.”   
He scooped her up and into her cradle, hoping she’d stay sleepy like she’d been during her bath. But the moment he got her settled in her bed, Zeke realized how wide awake Aggie was. He offered her one of her teething rings, which she chewed placidly for a minute, but then discarded. He considered just leaving the room and letting her put herself to sleep, but he also knew that rarely worked. And Aggie looked like she had a good amount of fussing left in her. He tiredly sat in the nearby rocking chair, so that the baby could still see him, but he didn’t have to keep standing. He gently rocked the cradle, hoping the movement would soothe her into sleep. After several minutes of just doing this, Zeke noticed himself nodding off quicker than Aggie was.   
Frustrated and tired, he picked Agatha up and lay her against his chest. He hoped the motion of the chair, as well as Aggie being able to hear his heartbeat, would speed things along. But when he looked at the clock on her dresser, it was almost two in the morning, and she was still wide awake. Zeke groaned, trying to get his sleep-deprived brain to work. He thought back to when he was a child, trying to remember what it was like when he was five. What had his mother done when baby William had trouble sleeping? Well, when all else failed, she would sing to him. Zeke cringed. He could barely carry a tune at the best of times. He worried his singing might make her start crying; he wouldn’t blame her.   
‘Still…’ he thought, rubbing the small of her back.   
“Dance to your daddy, my little…Aggie,” here he laughed to himself, “dance to your daddy, my little lamb.” Zeke half-hummed, half-mumbled this, and felt slightly silly doing so. He’d had to improvise a few words to make it more gender-neutral but was surprised it still rhymed. He struggled to remember the second half of the song. “You…you shall have a fishy, in your little dishy, you shall have a fishy, when the boat comes in.”   
Zeke hadn’t the faintest idea what an infant would want with a fish, given the lack of teeth, but those were indeed the lyrics. He didn’t know the rest of the song, so he repeated the two verses a few more times. He wasn’t sure how much of a difference the song had made, but Agatha did look a little sleepier. Zeke frowned. He hadn’t thought about his mother in such a long time. He realized, pained, that she probably would have scooped Aggie up and never put her back down.   
“I wish you could’ve met your grandmother,” he said solemnly.   
As for his extended family, he didn’t know who was still alive and who, for that matter, actually lived in the United States. Most of the Howells, as far as Zeke knew, were still in England. And the likelihood they even knew about Zeke was very small. He’d seen most of his extended family at his and Emily’s wedding, but even if you put a gun to his head, he probably couldn’t have named a single guest that wasn’t his parents, her parents, or William and kin.   
“Well, your uncle and aunts love you all the same,” Zeke smiled, pressing his lips to the top of her head.   
Aggie was fighting sleep at this point. Her eyes seemed to roll to the back of her head and her eyelids. To Zeke’s relief, it seemed to be a losing battle. After a few more minutes of kicking and fidgeting, she finally gave in and closed her eyes at last. Her father sighed in alleviation and exhaustion. Slowly as he could manage, he shifted the snoozing infant from his chest into his forearms. She twitched a little bit, and Zeke held his breath in terror, but then she yawned and settled. A rivulet of saliva ran down her cheek. He eased Aggie back into the cradle and waited for some kind of reaction. She stayed still, except for the rise and fall of her chest.   
It was only from sheer force of will that Zeke did not immediately fall asleep on the floor.   
(Present)  
In the weeks left before the beginning of summer, Zeke worked to replicate the same serum he’d used during his first gestation. He reasoned that if he could reintroduce it into his system earlier on, that the conception and subsequent pregnancy would go smoother. What he didn’t expect was that the formula made him irritable. He was already one of the stricter teachers at the university, not to mention that the impending finals were yet another looming task, further stressing him out, so his students were suddenly very eager to stay on his good side.   
Even Agatha wasn’t immune to the sudden mood swings. Zeke found himself snapping at her a bit too harshly, which either made her angrier or made her burst into tears depending on the situation. He’d taken her aside several times and apologized for the recent unpredictable behavior. Zeke blamed his strange moods on stress, at least when she or anyone else asked. He knew his apologies didn’t totally remedy the problem, but Aggie seemed reassured, nonetheless. But with writing his finals, helping Aggie prep for her own exams (doing all except tying her to her chair to get her to study her mathematics), and planning for the trip to New York on several levels, blaming his irritability on stress wasn’t too far off from the truth.   
The days seem to melt away until, out of the blue, it was June. Aggie was ecstatic to be free from her schooling, if only for a little while, but she was still moping about the fact that she’d have to stay at her uncle’s house for almost an entire year. As Zeke had expected, she was dragging her feet when it came to packing, and he was constantly having to nag her into progress. How had she become so lazy?   
“I’m leaving tomorrow,” Zeke sighed, “and you’re still not done.”   
“I am!” Aggie protested.  
“Two outfits and twenty-five books are not the definition of packed, young lady,” Zeke said.   
He opened her trunk back up and removed half the books stashed inside. Aggie quickly picked up a few of them and put them back in the luggage.   
“Bea-”  
“I won’t get my allowance while you’re gone. I won’t have new dime novels until maybe December, and I’ll be so behind in my stories,” she whined.   
“I’ll send you with some pocket money, so you don’t pester your uncle for it, but you’ll have to make it last several months. As for your hardbacks, there’s always the library, and I’m sure your aunt or uncle wouldn’t mind making a trip to the house if you need a book. But I don’t want you to stay in the house alone while I’m gone.”   
Aggie agreed to this and began pulling various clothing items from her bureau. A second pair of dungarees, three pairs of shoes, and more dresses and smocks to wear to school in the fall. She hesitated at first about packing Bobo, but eventually he went in the trunk, too. When her trunk was, at long last, completely packed, she began to sulk, brooding to herself on her bed.   
“What? You’re done, don’t you feel relieved?” Zeke asked.   
“It’s just…why can’t I come with you to New York?”  
Zeke sighed, “It’s not an option. We’ve been over this, Aggie Bea.”  
“I know! You’re going to work at night, you’ll be really busy, but Frieda and Carla can watch me,” she said.  
“No, they can’t. They have jobs. They’ll be busy, too, hon.”   
“Then I can take care of myself!”   
Zeke screwed his mouth. “I don’t want you to have to do that. That’s too much responsibility at once. Taking care of you is a full-time job.” He softly scratched her head. She ducked out of it.   
“I’m old enough! I don’t want to stay at Uncle William’s and Aunt Mary’s house,” she crossed her arms in a terrific pout.   
“Well, they want you there,” he offered. “I heard they’re going to cook pot pie for your first night with them.” Chicken pot pie was Aggie Bea’s favorite dish. Except she would pick out the celery.   
“They might want me, but Shelley sure doesn’t.”   
Zeke sat next to her on the bed. He tried to pick his words carefully.   
“Sweetest, I think this stay could be a great opportunity for you girls to finally connect. You should really be spending more time with your peers. You can’t possibly like being so alone all the time.”   
“I do,” she said, but Zeke could tell she was lying.   
“Wouldn’t it be nice to find a friend your age who likes everything you like?”   
“Shelley isn’t that friend. She doesn’t even talk to me at school. And she and her friends tease me during recess.”   
“Well,” Zeke relented. “Maybe Shelley isn’t a good friend for you. But there are so many other children in your school, and you’ll be a sixth year. You’ll probably have some new classmates.”   
Agatha stared at the floor, kicking her legs against the edge of the bed, and considering her father’s comment.   
“Besides that,” he continued, “perhaps you could try some more activities that other girls like.”   
She stared at him like he’d just asked her to climb to the roof and try to fly. “Why on earth would I do that?”  
“Because, other girls your age like certain activities that you aren’t as versed in. Rest assured, I love you just as you are, but other girls might find you a little, uh, different. Dolls are out of the question, but maybe, I don’t know,” Zeke admittedly struggled to think of what pre-teenage girls did, “talk about boys?”   
“Ew! Boys are gross,” Aggie said. She knew boys were good for racing and mud fights, but not for anything else. She knew for a fact that Thomas, a boy that Shelley liked, still picked his nose. Sometimes with his pencil. Why Shelley was attracted to him, of all people, was a mystery.   
“I will remind you of this statement when you begin pining for someone,” he smirked. “Specifically, I will remind you when you bring your beau to dinner.”   
“Good. Maybe you’ll be able to get older me to snap out of it.”   
Her father laughed. “I hope you find someone special someday, but there’s no rush to grow up. And anyway, we were talking about friendship. Isn’t there anyone in your class that you like?”   
She really thought about this, then said, “Betty. She sits in the back of the class with me.”  
“Why do you like her?” Zeke asked eagerly.   
“She hates Ms. Spencer as much as I do.”   
Zeke really didn’t want to praise a friendship built on mutual hate, but he was relieved his daughter talked to someone, anyone that wasn’t related to her. “Why don’t you spend some time with her over the summer?”  
“I don’t know her that well. Plus, I think she’s spending her summer with her grandma in Boston.”   
Zeke sighed, trying to think of some idea to make Agatha more social. “What if,” he said, “you go with Shelley to do whatever she does during the break? I know you don’t get along with her, but she might be around some kids you’ve never met before.”  
Agatha disagreed, but she also wanted her father to stop pestering her. “Maybe…”  
“I just don’t want you to spend your whole summer cooped up in Uncle William’s house by yourself.”  
“I go outside!” Aggie protested.  
“Yes. Alone. And you play alone. And climb trees alone,” Zeke sighed. “It’s good to have some friends to do all those things with.”   
Zeke was aware of how much of a hypocrite he was being. He’d been such a solitary child, himself. He studied any science book he could get his hands on and was interested in very little else. Being in constant possession of dead frogs or mice, he often frightened, or at least discomforted, the rest of his schoolmates. Teachers and schoolmarms found him studious, to be sure, but very odd. “He doesn’t play during breaks,” a teacher once wrote to his parents, “but instead just sits and observes. Like someone watching a mound of ants’ scurry around in an ant farm. Fellow teachers have found him disquieting, to say the least.” After too many complaints, Zeke’s father was fed up with his eldest child, and shipped him off to a boarding school for boys. It was this school, as well as his time in college, that he found himself being more social, often with peers that shared his morbid interests. Though they were few and far between until medical school.   
He’d considered boarding school for Agatha for the upcoming year, while he was in New York, but decided against it in the more recent months. Boarding school had felt like a punishment to Zeke, but that might have also been because his father never wrote him. His mother did, monthly at least, as did his brother, but his time there had forever tarnished his relationship with Nathaniel Howell. Not that it had been terribly strong to begin with. But it more or less reassured Zeke of his decision to be a doctor and ignore his father’s very vocal protests. It was a lonely decision that further isolated himself from his family, but as he excelled in his classes, he was constantly encouraged by his successes that it was a good decision. All the same, Zeke had trouble naming any of his pre-college friends. And the friends he made in college were just as odd as he was. He was trying to steer Agatha away from a similar situation.   
‘Unless my peculiarities have already rubbed off,’ he thought glumly.   
He looked at his daughter who sat impatiently next to him. He could tell she was looking for a chance to bolt from the conversation.   
“Look, I only wanted to tell you that I know what it’s like to be a little different on the social level. You’ll get there, but even one or two friends helps that road feel less lonely. Can you at least promise me you’ll try to make some friends while I’m gone?”   
Aggie mulled the idea over, chewing her tongue.   
“Will you send me some book money if I make a friend?”  
Her father frowned. “Aggie, I’m not going to pay you to be more social.”  
“Worth a try,” she said, then nodded resolutely. “Alright, I’ll give it a shot.”   
“Atta girl,” Zeke said, patting her on the back.   
Zeke stood to leave, but Aggie stopped him.  
“Does it have to be a human friend? If I find a friendly possum or squirrel, does-?”  
“No, it doesn’t count!”   
As he left, Agatha walked over to her vanity and picked up the daguerreotype of her mother. She traced her finger over the outline of Emily’s hair. She knew she wasn’t supposed to move it; Papa said it could get damaged. But she gently closed it and hid it under her clothes in the trunk. Bobo had been staring at her the whole time.   
She frowned and leaned in close to the bear’s head, whispering, “I was never here.”   
Aggie carefully shut the trunk, then rushed from her room and down the stairs to play outside.


	6. Chapter 6

“Did you make sure to clean the bathroom? And put fresh sheets on the bed?”  
“Why on earth did these questions come to you at this very moment?”   
Frieda squinted at Carla as the two were scrubbing remnants of blood off their arms. It splashed against the sides of the sinks, the bright red standing out against the white porcelain. They’d just performed a successful cardiac bypass, and now Carla was talking about tidying the house.   
“Did you do these things, or not?” she huffed.   
“I didn’t get around to the bathroom,” Frieda admitted.  
“Frieda…”  
“I’ve been busy!” she hissed.   
“And I haven’t?” Carla said. “I have possibly five times more work to do today than you do.”  
Frieda scowled, “I’ll clean the bathroom when I get home.”   
“Don’t go straight home, remember?” Carla said, toweling her hands.   
She quickly undid her bloodied smock and tossed it in one of the laundry bins. Smoothing any creases in her dress, Carla quickly hurried into the hospital hallway, a harried Frieda at her heels.   
“Grab Zeke from the train station, then go home,” Frieda recited. She popped open her watch and swore under her breath. “I’ll have to leave soon if I want to get there on time.”   
“I need to go, too. I have an appointment with the patient in 407.”  
Frieda peeked over her shoulder Carla’s paperwork. “Hernia? I don’t envy you.”  
“It was better than Mr. Garret the other day. Dysentery?” she said.   
Frieda cringed, remembering the mess. “See you at home, love,” she whispered, though they were out of anyone’s earshot.   
Carla turned a corner and booked it up a set of stairs, while Frieda kept on a straight path, back towards her wife’s office. Arriving, she unlocked and threw open the door. She snatched her bag from the desk and began shoving in any necessary work or tools that couldn’t wait until tomorrow. She was behind on her paperwork, for one, so the patients’ files went in first. Frieda eyed the cabinet against the wall, thinking. It was full of bottled body parts, mainly ones deformed in some way, but a few of them were normal.   
Frieda fished the key out of Carla’s desk and opened the cabinet, withdrawing one of the bottles. Floating inside was an ovary, recently taken from an anonymous female patient who dealt with frequent cysts. Carla had taken it from the storage rooms, hiding it in plain sight. Neither of the women did the surgery themselves, so they hadn’t the faintest idea what the woman actually looked like. Her skin color, eye color, hair color, and any other physical attribute were all a complete mystery. The bottle went into Frieda’s bag as well.   
She privately hoped the baby would look like Carla.   
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
The cab’s horse trotted to a stop outside of Penn Station. Frieda alighted from the cab and paid the man to wait. She walked to the platform, trying to spot her friend in the crowd. That was no small feat, given his stature, but she hoped she might catch a flash of his red hair. The platform smelled like a combination of cigarette smoke, perfume, and various greases.   
Frieda didn’t like having to be this close to the downtown area. The air always felt dirty, and it made Frieda want to take a bath. Not to mention the smog, which seemed to worsen every year. She and Carla lived on the edge of town, making their commutes longer, but the air wasn’t as bad, nor was the traffic. She knew she had a more privileged life than most of the working women in New York, so she tried not to complain, but a part of her had been tempted to ask Carla if they could move further from the city. Even out of it completely.   
But, no. Their jobs were much too nice to think about changing things. And with the child they may or may not be having, they’d certainly have to stay put. At least for a few more years. Possibly until one or both of them retired, which for Frieda, at least, was almost thirty years down the line. Both of them having jobs, they had more of a disposable income now than they’d ever had, but not so disposable that one of them could choose to be unemployed. While they had been trying to conceive, Frieda and Carla had been trying to decide who would be the stay-at-home mother. But realizing they couldn’t really afford for one of them to be completely jobless, Frieda ultimately decided she’d either take a lower position at Stonecraft, or find another job completely, possibly something at night, so she could care for the infant during the day. She realized she’d be completely exhausted until the baby got a proper sleep schedule, but it would be too complicated, not to mention risky, to hire a nursemaid.   
Frieda felt conflicted over her decision to do this, but what choice did they have? Carla made more money than her. Frieda had, for months now, been a few tests away from being a real doctor. Until then, she was a “surgeon’s assistant,” which really meant she was qualified in every way to perform surgery but on paper. She wasn’t necessarily authorized to make final decisions about patients, but the other doctors at Stonecraft “considered her opinions” quite carefully. And nine times out of ten, her influence made a difference. She’d been meaning to take her exams but missed a few of the test dates due to emergency procedures. Frieda signed up for a new exam date at the end of the summer, and she intended to make it.   
Someone grabbed her arm and she nearly jumped out of her skin.   
“Sorry,” Zeke said hastily, “I just figured you couldn’t see me.”   
“I didn’t,” she breathed, her heart pounding. “Let’s get out of here.”   
Frieda helped him wheel the trolley that held his cumbersome trunk. She was a little surprised he didn’t have more luggage, but then again, she guessed he didn’t need much. Didn’t men normally pack light? Not that “Zeke” and “normal” often went together in the same sentence.   
“How was the trip?” She asked, helping him attach the trunk to the back of the cab. A porter wheeled the trolley away.   
“Average. I got a bit of reading done,” Zeke answered.  
“Oh? Anything interesting?”  
“A novel Aggie’s been pestering me to read. Wells’ ‘The War of the Worlds.’ It’s rather fantastical, if you ask me, but she devoured it. I think she’s had some nightmares as a result but is trying not to let me find out. She’s such a poor liar,” Zeke said, chuckling to himself.   
He opened the door for Frieda and the two of them hopped in the cab. The horse began trotting away from the station.   
“Miss her already?” Frieda asked.  
“A bit, I won’t lie, but it’s also nice to be child free for a while. I plan on telephoning her at least once a week, I hope you don’t mind. I’ll help offset telephone costs.”   
“As long as I can talk to her, too, of course I don’t mind,” Frieda grinned.  
“To be sure. She’ll probably beg me to let her talk to you.”   
“As it should be,” she laughed.   
The cab roiled over the cobblestone streets, past businesses, street markets, and schools. Zeke watched out the window as the cab wheeled by children in a school yard, playing with hoops and jump ropes. He hoped Agatha was getting along with her cousin. He’d dropped her off at Williams house approximately three days ago, and she was pouting the whole time. And even after showering her with goodbye kisses and promises to phone her, she still had a sour look as he walked out the door. Zeke wondered if she had cheered by this point, for William and Mary’s sake, at least. She could be quite stubborn, especially in her moods. He’d phone her later in the evening, after he got settled, to see how the first three days had gone. He prayed they’d gone well.  
After about thirty rocky minutes riding through the streets of NYC, the cabbie pulled up outside of Frieda and Carla’s charming little townhouse, which was actually bigger than Zeke remembered. As the cab pulled away, Frieda and Zeke lugged the trunk up to the front stoop.   
“What’s in here? It’s so heavy!” Frieda chided, gasping for breath.  
“Well, I only wanted to bring one piece of luggage,” Zeke grumbled.   
“To haul a corpse around?”  
“Hardy har har,” he rolled his eyes.   
The luggage fell to the foyer floor with a bang.   
“Well!” Frieda sighed.   
Zeke looked around the room. The interior was more or less how he remembered it. It was a similar build to his own, only they had four bedrooms instead of three, they had a bath in both lavatories as opposed to only the one upstairs, and it was electrified. Most of the foyer and downstairs rooms were wallpapered with a flowery pattern that Zeke found hideous, though he kept that to himself. The house had a vague scent of potpourri and lavender. Zeke and Frieda decided to empty the trunk best they could, making several trips up and down the stairs, until finally the trunk was light enough to be taken up on its own. The bedroom Zeke was given had two double beds, one of them having been moved from the room Zeke presumed was now the nursery. On one of the beds, a small stack of fresh towels was set. The room also had a chest of drawers with a mirror atop it, a desk, and a small bookshelf. Zeke hesitantly flipped the light switch, and the lights blinked on.   
“Still not really used to that,” he muttered, setting an armful of things on his chosen bed.   
“The bedside lamps are still oil-based,” Frieda explained. “But yes, every other room has electricity.”   
“I suppose I still need to get with the times,” Zeke said. He shrugged off his coat and hung it on one of the bed posts.   
“Don’t forget to flip the switch whenever you exit a room, or the bulbs will burn out, alright?”   
“I’ll try my best not to let it slip my mind.”  
“So,” Frieda said, “coffee or tea? If you’re hungry now, I can make you something, otherwise you’ll have to wait until dinner. And Carla’s going to be home a little late, so we’ll probably sup around eight or so.”  
“No, no. Don’t go to all the trouble. Actually, if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to lie down for a bit. Didn’t sleep particularly well on the train.” Zeke rubbed his eyes.  
“Oh! Of course. We’ll have plenty of time to socialize later,” she smiled. “And you know where the bathroom is, so…I’ll leave you to your own devices. If Carla asks, the bathroom was clean when you got here.”  
“Fair enough,” Zeke chuckled, then stopped, perking, “Although, I wouldn’t mind seeing the nursery. If that’s alright, that is.”   
“Absolutely!” Frieda blurted.   
The duo walked out of the room and across the hall. Frieda opened the door and they both entered. Behind the door was a room with pale yellow wallpaper, but not so yellow to assault the senses. The furniture was all teak, and included a tall cradle, a small bed for when the child got a little older, a changing table, a rocking horse, a dollhouse, and a large toy chest. The window was adorned with white lace curtains. The room also had a small gated fireplace, and a small basket cradle so the baby could sleep downstairs if needed.   
“Oh, Frieda, it’s lovely!” Zeke gushed.   
“I can’t take much credit. Carla did most of it,” Frieda said.  
Eyeing the toy chest, Zeke said, “I should have brought you Aggie’s old dolls. She never even looks at them.”   
“Well, we’ll surely make other visits, if we’re not sick of you after this sabbatical,” Frieda chuckled.   
“How long have you had all this?”   
“Almost a year, I think. We set it up when we thought we’d be able to adopt the first child, but as you know, that’s happened to us about six other times.”  
“I wish you had told me sooner.” His face fell, “I’m so sorry. But this is all about to be remedied.”  
Frieda’s mouth formed a tight line. “And you’re sure you want to do this?”  
“I’ve already been taking the serum. It’s been in my system for almost two months now.”   
“And you know we’ll never be able to repay you for this?”  
Zeke smiled, “You already have. I wouldn’t have Aggie without you.” Frieda rubbed her arm. Zeke could sense her discomfort. “Everything will go fine,” he said.  
Frieda decided to move on for the time being. “So, you’ve been taking the formula already. Any side effects.”  
“Unfortunately,” Zeke sighed. “Which reminds me, it’s almost five. I need to take some right now.”  
They both left the nursery and returned to the guest room. Zeke rooted around in his things until he found the rack of small vials. He uncorked one and quickly ingested it, grimacing as he did. He set the rack of remaining vials on the desk.   
“Side effects? Such as?” Frieda pressed.   
“For one, I’ve been a little…on edge. I’ve been a little hot under the collar and snapped at a few people who didn’t deserve it. My daughter, for instance.” Zeke still felt guilty about that.   
“Anything else?”   
“Well…” he muttered. His face flushed bright red.   
“Go on,” she said.  
“My…my chest has felt a little sensitive lately,” he said. “I’ve accidentally hit my chest against things, and it hurt like the devil.”   
“Didn’t you have that problem with your last pregnancy?”  
“Yes, but I’m not even pregnant yet,” he grumbled.   
“Oh, that reminds me. I’ll be right back,” Frieda said, then hastily quit the room.   
Zeke began putting his clothing in the provided bureau. He put most of his bigger clothes towards the bottom. The doctor figured that as long as he could keep wearing his slimmer outfits, he would. He assumed he wouldn’t be needing the maternity wear for several more months. He dug through the remaining objects in the trunk, pulling out his journal and some medical equipment. Zeke hadn’t packed too much; he knew when he started working at Stonecraft, he’d have access to more than he even owned himself. Still, he brought a basic microscope, a hypodermic needle, a stethoscope, and a few spare beakers. He arranged all of this neatly on the desk.   
He quickly flipped to the latter half of the notebook and jotted down that he’d taken the second dose of his formula for that day. Counting the remaining vials, Zeke presumed he’d have to make more in about two weeks. Despite being on the serum for almost six weeks, he was still trying to wrap his head around what he was about to go through. Again. He prayed the first trimester would go smoother than the last time. The hyperemesis was without a doubt one of the worst parts of the whole gestation. The back of his throat had tasted like vomit for weeks on end, and he still had nightmares about how gaunt he’d looked.   
Zeke placed a hand against his midriff. He could feel the scars beneath his shirt, tracing them with his fingers. Frieda walked back into the room and set a small jar on the desk. Zeke picked it up and examined it. The ovary floated in the jostled fluid.   
“So,” he said thoughtfully, “this is it, then, is it?”   
“It’s the one we’ve picked,” she nodded.  
“Know anything about the mother?”  
“Only that she’s missing one of, if not both of her ovaries, and she had chronic ovarian cysts.”  
“You didn’t perform the surgery?”  
“No, and neither did Carla,” she sighed.  
“So, you have no idea what the resulting child will look like?” Zeke almost laughed at the strangeness of it all.  
“Correct,” Frieda nodded, having anticipated the question. “Truth be told, I feel more comfortable having never met the mother. If the child looked like a patient of mine, it would probably be very discomforting.”   
“And should the child look like me?”   
“I’ll hope the mother’s genes are stronger than yours,” she smirked. “When do you think we should start the whole…process?”   
Zeke jotted a few notes regarding what Frieda had told him about the ovary. “One second…”  
“Probably sooner rather than later, right?” Frieda thought for a moment, then said, “What about the placement of the womb?”   
“Ah, yes. About that,” Zeke sighed. “I thought perhaps I could try gestating this child in my abdominal cavity.”  
Frieda’s eyebrow went as high as it could go. “Are you sure?”  
Zeke blew a puff of air, then bit his lip. “I’m not sure we have a choice.”   
“It’d just be a month to recover from the placement, right? Like with Aggie?”   
“See, that’s banking on the hope that I’d conceive sometime, at least, by September. The problem is, if I can’t get pregnant by that point, we’ll have to cancel the project. Then I’d have to go under the knife again just to remove something we’d placed mere weeks ago.”   
“So…you wouldn’t…”  
“The fact is, I can’t afford to stay here longer than I have to, and if my time working with Stonecraft is finished next June, I’d need to get back home as soon as I could. The delivery of the child alone is another month’s recovery. At the very least, two weeks.”  
Frieda sat on the end of the bed; her brow furrowed in thought. “You really want to try this without a faux womb?”   
“I’ve been thinking, and I realized that the fetus itself creates a protective barrier, that of the amniotic sac, which might be enough to keep it safe until it’s at term,” Zeke continued. “It’s not an entirely ideal choice, but the timing of this pregnancy is so exact, we can barely afford to waste a single day. Not to mention that it’ll take at least a month to see if the zygote attached. If not, then it’s back to square one.”   
“Then we’d have, at best, three tries for you to conceive,” Frieda continued.   
“Correct.”   
Frieda sighed deeply. “We need to discuss this with Carla. As a group.”   
Zeke nodded. “Of course.”   
“And, I might need to do some more thinking,” she admitted. “Processing all the new information.”   
Frieda stood and walked to the door.   
“Frieda,” Zeke said, and she paused. “I want you to know that I still want to do this for you. It’s just a bit more complicated than it was with Aggie. Now that we have other commitments, that is. But I’m still completely onboard.”  
Frieda nodded, tongue in her cheek. “I better get to cleaning the bathroom.”   
She walked out without another word, closing the door behind her. Zeke kicked his shoes off in preparation for his nap, but paused, looking at the preserved ovary on the desk. Zeke picked it up and looked at it. He could see the small bubbles on the surface that were the cysts and cringed. Seeing how most of the women in his life seemed to suffer from some kind of reproductive-related malady, Zeke was happy to have been born with male sex organs. And the fact that he’d been able to bear a child, to do something so distinctly female, the privilege was not lost on him, yet he’d sworn he wouldn’t do it again. Yet here he was.   
‘I must truly be mad,’ he thought.   
And yet. Zeke looked at the jar again.   
“I wonder who you will be,” he said.


	7. Chapter 7

“Wanna go with me to the drug store?”   
Aggie peered over the top of her magazine at her cousin, trying to scrutinize her expression. It seemed completely without pretense, if not a little irritated.   
“Why?” Agatha asked.  
“So you can buy another one of your stupid dime novels, I don’t know,” Shelley shrugged.   
Aggie was splayed out on the sofa of her uncle’s house, reading one of her “stupid” dime novels. It’d only been two weeks or so, but Aggie felt like she’d been stuck in the house for longer. She knew that Shelley was only inviting her along because she’d been goaded by Uncle William into doing so. Aggie wasn’t sure whether to feel happy to be included or annoyed that someone almost had to be bribed to spend time with her.   
“I’ll get my shoes,” Aggie said, rolling off the couch. “Can you wait for me?”  
She only asked because, sometimes, Shelley had already walked a block by the time she’d caught up. Shelley begrudgingly agreed to stay on the porch until she got back. Agatha clambered up the stairs and into the room she shared with her cousin. She riffled through her trunk to where she hid her money. Agatha was fairly sure Shelley wouldn’t steal from her, but not entirely sure. It was best to keep it hidden regardless. She counted her savings. She could probably get a new “Brave and Bold” or “Wild West Weekly” today and still have some left over for later.  
While in her trunk, she took a peek at her mother’s picture, feeling a strange knot of guilt that she’d taken it without asking. Papa didn’t know she had it, most likely, and would hopefully not find out. He explained before that it wasn’t that he didn’t want her to have a picture of her mother, but that he didn’t want it to get damaged. Her father only had about five pictures of Mama. Aggie stared at the photo intensely. Her mother had been beautiful. Aggie knew she shouldn’t be so superficial. Mama had been very smart, too. But Aggie secretly prided herself on having a beautiful mother. She loved moments where Papa would tell her she looked “more like her mother every day.” It practically made her glow.   
“Are you coming?!” Shelley called up the stairs.   
“Sorry! Coming!”   
Aggie clapped the frame shut and tucked it away, then grabbed her shoes and raced back down the stairs.   
\------------------------------------------------------------------  
“Do you want peppermint, lemon, or cinnamon?” Shelley said.   
The two girls were standing at the counter, ogling the many sugary confections. As much as Aggie loved dime novels, being a child, she wasn’t immune to the allure of candy. After agonizing over the decision, she finally picked a cinnamon candy stick, while Shelley had mint. The girls exited the pharmacy, Shelley already sucking on her candy, Aggie paging through her new magazine. Nobby Nat was in a new adventure, and Aggie had to know what was happening.   
“Why do you read those?” Shelley asked, verging on sincere.   
“Gunfights, horse chases, runaway trains, outlaws. What’s not to like? Living in the west must be so exciting. I wish I were a pioneer.”   
“But that’s all boy stuff,” she said.  
“Nuh-uh. Nobby Nat is a girl, and she rides horses faster than Buffalo Bill!” Aggie insisted. “Plus, Aunt Carla tells me all kinds of cool stories about living on the prairie.”  
Shelley continued, undeterred. “You know that’s not proper, don’t you? Women shouldn’t ride horses except for leisure.”   
“But that’s boring,” she said. “Trotting around on a horse is dull if it isn’t going fast.”  
“Everything is boring to you! You don’t like dolls, you don’t like dresses, you don’t like tea parties. How do you ever expect to attract a boy if you’re not womanly?”  
“Why on earth would I want to do that? Boys are repugnant.”   
“Don’t you want to find a beau someday? Or do you want to be like Ms. Ross down the street? She’s a spinster,” Shelley giggled.  
“Spinster” seemed to be a bad word, according to Shelley, but Agatha always thought Ms. Amelia Ross looked very happy. She was a nice older woman, always offering the kids baked sweets when they stopped by. She had a beautiful garden, a huge house, and many, many friends. Aggie wasn’t one for flowers, per se, but the rest sounded nice.   
“I like Ms. Ross,” Aggie nodded.  
Shelley giggled shrilly. “Come on, we’re going to the park. My friends are gathering there. Just don’t talk to me when I’m with them.”  
“Don’t worry,” Aggie mumbled, returning to her story.  
The girls made their way to the neighborhood park, where Shelley was supposed to meet her friends. The warm summer grass made Aggie wish she could take her shoes off, but then she remembered how Aunt Mary had reacted when she’d tracked mud through the foyer the week prior and thought better of it. She instead made herself comfy on one of the empty park benches and kept paging through her dime novel. Shelley’s group of classmates arrived after a bit, including Liam, who Aggie loathed, Shelley’s friends Alice and Emma, and Thomas, Shelley’s crush of the month.   
‘Nose picker,’ Aggie thought, smiling to herself. ‘Where’s your booger pencil?’  
Despite being a few feet away from the crowd, Aggie could still hear the raucous conversation. She peered over her magazine at the group.   
“Oh great,” Liam groaned, “you brought the weirdo!”   
“It’s not my fault,” Shelley said. “Papa makes me bring her. Besides, I told her to leave us alone.”  
“She better!” Alice said. “I bet she has fleas. Like a tramp.”  
“Why doesn’t she bathe?” Emma asked.  
Aggie flushed a little at this comment. She bathed, and she certainly didn’t have fleas! It was just that getting dirty again was so easy, and it was hard to stay clean when she spent all her time playing outside. And her hair was hard to manage, so it stuck to her like a big auburn cloud.   
“Just ignore her,” Shelley mumbled. She tossed her tight brown curls dismissively.   
‘Yes, please ignore me, you simpletons,’ she thought.  
“Hey, I hear the circus is going to be in town in a few weeks!” Alice said.  
“Wow! I wonder if they’ll really have elephants! And people who fly out of cannons, like the posters say!” Thomas said.  
Aggie perked a little at the statements. Circuses sometimes had magic acts. Or so she’d been told. She’d never actually been to one.   
“We can all go together,” Emma chimed.   
“Papa won’t let me go somewhere like that alone,” Shelley groaned, “He and Mama will want to come with.”  
“Maybe they can take all of us!” Liam said.   
Agatha frowned. The circus sounded fun, but she wouldn’t go anywhere with Shelley’s friends. Let alone Liam.   
“What are you looking at, flea bag?” Thomas spat at Aggie. She scowled.   
“I bet she has rabies,” Liam laughed.  
“I creamed you once, I can do it again!” Aggie said, trying to sound as threatening as possible.   
“You couldn’t cream corn!”   
“Wow, Liam, quite a fancy comeback from someone who’s practically illiterate.”  
“Shut up! I throw my trash away in the garbage like you’re ‘sposed to!”  
Aggie thought for a moment, “That’s littering, you idiot!”   
“Leave her alone…she’ll tattle to my parents,” Shelley sighed.   
“Not if I shut her yap for her,” Liam began rolling his sleeves up.   
Aggie tensed. She didn’t feel threatened, certainly not by Liam, who was a waif compared to some, but she knew if she was caught fighting again, her papa might come all the way back to D.C. just to tan her hide. While she was weighing the pros and cons of beating Liam to a pulp, he’d grabbed hold of her hair and yanked hard. She shrieked and kicked him square in the chest.   
“Aggie! Quit it,” her cousin snapped.   
But Aggie had already leaped onto Liam’s chest and was slapping him silly. Despite her best efforts, he’d gotten a few swipes in. Aggie could feel her cheek bleeding after his nails scraped across it. And he’d pulled out some of her hair, which was almost enough to make her cry. But she refused to show any tears to Liam Wenston. Her slaps turned to punches as the anger inside her bloomed. She kept landing punch after punch until the boy was very bruised and her fists were a little bloody.   
When she’d had her fill, she said, “You know, Liam, I throw trash in the garbage, too!”   
She grabbed him by his collar, lifted him off the ground, to the other kids’ astonishment, and dumped him into one of the park’s trash cans. Thomas stifled a laugh, but the girls were aghast.   
“Aggie!” Shelley shrieked. “What is wrong with you?!”   
“What’s wrong with me? He started it!”  
“He was flirting! Boys pull your hair when they flirt,” she continued.  
Thomas laughed even harder. Liam looked like he was about to protest, but Aggie spoke first, “That’s disgusting! Boys are gross! Especially him!” She spat on the ground for emphasis.   
“Grow up, Aggie! You’re so immature!” Emma said.   
“When are you going to act like a real girl?” Alice added.   
“I’m a real girl!” Aggie said, as she felt her nose begin to bleed.   
Shelley’s friend group pulled a battered Liam out of the trash and started walking away.   
“Shelley, wait…” Aggie said.  
Shelley turned to her cousin and scowled. “Leave. Me. Alone.” She hesitated, then shouted, “You freak!”   
Agatha flinched. She didn’t stop Shelley again as she and her friends left the park. She let Shelley’s word roll around in her mouth, like a spoonful of bad medicine. Not knowing what else to do, she pulled a stained handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her bloodied face. She rolled her dime novel up and tucked it in one of her pockets, hearing it smash against the crushed candy stick. Agatha slowly began the long trek back to the house.  
\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------  
Zeke poked his head into Dr. Wilkins office, but found his friend to be absent. He slipped through the doorway and shut it behind him. It was the first time he’d seen Carla’s personal office, as it was a fairly recent acquisition. Besides the sundry medical equipment or anatomical samples that seemed to cover every square inch of the room, Carla also had a vase of very dead flowers that sat to one side of her desk. She also had two chairs that faced the desk, mainly for patient consultation, and a small leather lounge to the side of the room.   
Zeke approached the desk and sat down his small black satchel. The leather was worn from years of use, and it had holes, but Zeke was too fond of it to replace it. He snapped it open and withdrew a small vial and his hypodermic syringe kit. Today would be the first, and hopefully only attempt, to implant the ovum in his abdomen. He hadn’t felt any amounts of hesitation leading up to this moment, but earlier, as the hansom cab pulled up to Stonecraft, he felt his hands shaking. In that moment, he was relieved he’d asked Carla to help with the insemination. He wasn’t sure he could hold the needle with steady hands. Zeke gingerly set the vial, which contained the fertilized ovum, on the desk surface. He eyed the clock that hung on the wall. He dug one of the formula phials from his bag and quickly swallowed the bitter liquid. The doctor gagged, and wished he prepared a water chaser. Setting his journal on the desk as well, Zeke checked off his mental checklist. It’d been so long since the first experiment, but Zeke was amazed at how many little details he remembered.   
Having readied everything he needed, Zeke wandered around the office, hands in the pockets of his slacks. The office was certainly nicer than anything Carla had worked in before. Even so, Zeke recognized certain books or equipment she’d owned in Middlesport. He could tell she was trying to fill the empty spaces, probably unaccustomed to all the extra nooks and crannies. A human skeleton hung in the corner, oddly missing a good majority of its teeth. Zeke peered into the glass of the cabinets. They mostly held a variety of pharmaceutical drugs, but the taller, harder to reach shelves had a number of medical oddities. In his stint as an anatomical artist, Zeke was not a stranger to the more bizarre corners of medicine, but even so these specimens were interesting. A solid black, frostbitten hand, an entirely calcified heart, and a tumor that appeared to have hair and teeth.   
The door opened abruptly, and Zeke jumped. Carla looked at him with amusement.   
“Sorry if I startled you. And sorry I’m late,” she said, locking the door behind her. “The appointment I was in ran late. When is your meeting with Dr. Woodvale?”  
“In about an hour,” he said.   
Zeke had a meeting with the head of Stonecraft Hospital to go over his duties as a night nurse and to have a general tour of the facility. He hoped to be promptly on time, even earlier if he could manage. He wanted to make a good first impression, as he was not only representing himself, but his friends that already worked at Stonecraft, as well as his university. Perhaps that was why he was so anxious on the way over.   
“Oh good. We have time. Would you mind if I ate while we work? This is my lunch break,” Carla said, and pulled a lunch pail from one of her desk drawers.   
“Not at all,” he said, settling in one of the chairs. “Is Frieda coming?”  
“Unfortunately, not. She got caught up in an unexpected surgery,” Carla said, cracking a boiled egg on the side of her desk. “She said she’s sad to miss it, but that she’ll see you at home tonight before you leave for your first shift.”  
“So,” she said between bites of her egg, “how have you been feeling?”  
“Fine. Still on the irritable side. I’ve been rather eager to start working again. You know me. I don’t like having excessive amounts of time where I’m unproductive.”   
“I meant physically,” she said. She flipped open a small notebook and uncapped her pen, then set both items to the side of her desk.   
“Ah, well,” Zeke shrugged, “normal? My chest has felt a little tender lately, but other than that.”  
“Let’s get your vitals beforehand,” she said, brushing the salt off her hands. “Sit on the lounge, remove your shirt, if you please.”  
“I’d appreciate if you’d run your eggy hands under a tap,” he said, frowning.  
“Picky, picky, picky...” Carla smirked.  
Zeke shrugged off his vest and shirt, feeling slightly exposed. He realized that Dr. Carla Wilkins had seen more of his body than his own kin, but he still felt slightly uncomfortable being nude in front of a woman. The doctor dutifully washed and dried her hands, then rolled her sleeves back before pulling a handful of medical instruments out of her desk drawers. She listened to Zeke’s pulse, which, to her surprise, was racing.   
“Too much coffee this morning?” She asked.  
“I suppose I’m a little on edge today,” he admitted. “Possibly about meeting Woodvale. I didn’t sleep well either, so I may have had some extra coffee without thinking.”  
“Well, she can be a bit standoffish, but she means well. And she runs this hospital like clockwork,” Carla said. She examined Zeke’s eyes and mouth.   
“She?”  
“Yes, the head doctor is a woman. Did no one tell you?”   
“Perhaps it just slipped my mind,” Zeke shivered a little.  
“Any ideas why you haven’t been sleeping well? The bed can’t be that bad. Speaking of which, lie down please.”  
“I couldn’t stop thinking about Aggie. There didn’t seem to be any clear reason she came to mind, other than some sort of parent intuition,” he said, the leather of the couch sticking to his bare skin. “Maybe I just miss her.”  
“You should phone her if you miss her that much,” she said. Carla had begun dabbing some betadine on Zeke’s midriff.  
Zeke flushed. “I don’t want to pester her. She has her own life. Besides, we telephone each other plenty. Any more and your bills would be outrageous.”  
Carla retrieved the syringe from the desk and turned back to Zeke. “So…ready?”   
“As I’ll ever be. Are you?”   
“I have my own reservations,” Carla said, sitting beside him on the lounge, “but it seems this has become the most direct route to Frieda and me having a child. Ironically.”   
“The irony of this situation isn’t lost on me,” he smiled faintly.   
“And you’re sure you want to go through all of this again?”  
“I’ve given myself enough time to really think it over, and yes, I’m positive,” Zeke said, sounding surer than he felt.   
Dr. Wilkins nodded with him and began gently probing his abdomen. After a minute, her fingers rested just under his navel. Carla had Frieda explain the implantation process to her several times, and this was the region that the needle was inserted. Carla wanted every step to go as smoothly as possible.   
Zeke had propped himself on his elbows and was watching intently. Carla pushed the needle into his skin, stopping only when it was 3/4ths of the way in. Zeke gritted his teeth at the sting. Dr. Wilkins pushed the syringe contents into Zeke’s abdomen, then quickly removed the needle. She held a wad of gauze to the site.   
“And that’s that,” she said. On the surface, she seemed very nonchalant, but inside she was shaking with excitement.   
“I’m not sure how different it will be to simply carry the fetus in my abdominal cavity. Still, I hope it takes,” Zeke said. He lay flat on the couch, hands folded over the gauze on his stomach.   
“You’ll tell Frieda or me if you start feeling unusual, right? Besides any normal symptoms,” Carla said firmly.   
“Of course,” he muttered. “If this gestation proves to be like the last one, I won’t experience symptoms for quite a while. Still, we can run a urine test in about two weeks. It should show if the embryo has attached by then.”   
“If not?” Carla asked.  
“If the test proves negative, we’ll start over. I’m willing to try three times in total, but if it gets too close to Autumn, we’ll have to scrap the whole project.”   
“Frieda mentioned that. It really is quite kind of you to try more than once. Then again, it’s immensely kind that you’re trying this at all.”  
He gave her a crooked smile. “Well, let’s hope this is the one and only attempt.”   
Zeke sat back up and began redressing, careful to keep his shirt and waistcoat from wrinkling. The needle site was still a bit sore, but he no longer needed the gauze.   
“Any parting words of advice for warming up to Woodvale?” Zeke asked, buttoning his vest.   
“Don’t try to. She can tell. Just be polite and direct.”   
Carla checked the clock on the wall and bade her companion a good afternoon. She rushed out the door without so much as a goodbye. Zeke didn’t mind. It was unusual how much alone time he’d gotten lately. In his everyday life, he didn’t even get privacy in the bathroom. But in a house without Agatha, it was much quieter. He could even hear himself think, and he didn’t have to worry that the silence was something suspicious. He was starting to think he might get bored of the silence and end up creating his own chaos to fill the void.   
Zeke left Carla’s office and almost ran right into the Stonecraft head herself.   
“Excuse me!” He quickly threw out, trying not to seem flustered.   
His eyes roved over the woman he’d run into. She seemed only slightly put off. Brushing out the creases in her dark brown dress, she stood straight and tall, smoothing any flyaway hairs in her brown and silver hairdo. The way she carried herself, firm and sure, reminded Zeke of how Carla acted when they’d first met.   
“Quite alright. Happens to the best of us,” she said, but even this statement felt brusque. Her lips were small, red, and pursed.   
“Dr. Woodvale?”   
“Yes? And you?”  
“Sorry. Dr. Howell,” he said, then hurriedly added, “ma’am.”   
“Ah. Howell. You’re early. I was just walking to the lobby to meet you,” she said. Her expression didn’t change in the slightest.   
“Well, I had a previous engagement with a colleague and friend of mine.”   
“All the same. At least you’re prompt.”  
Woodvale started walking, and Zeke rushed to keep up with her long stride. She bested him by being almost a foot taller than him.   
“Now,” she began talking, “you come highly recommended by your dean.”  
Zeke almost blushed. He hadn’t known the dean thought so highly of him.   
“Still, I’ve never employed a certified doctor in a nurse’s position, and I continue to have reservations about doing so,” Woodvale continued. “I need to know you can take direction and criticism. I hold high standards for all of my employees. This hospital values promptness, sanitation, courtesy, and professionalism.”   
“Understood.”  
“Very good. The attire for all male nurses at Stonecraft is more or less what you’re currently wearing. You are to don a surgical apron at all times, and to change it if it ever becomes soiled. You may or may not wear your waistcoat; I will allow your personal preference in this case. We uphold the values of Joseph Lister, so you are required to wash your hands between patients. Regardless of whether or not they’ve touched bodily fluids. If you are not doing so, believe me, I will find out, and you will be punished.”  
“Yes ma’am,” Zeke said, keeping a mental checklist. He hoped whatever aprons he’d receive wouldn’t be too terribly long. Though, he had become quite adept at clothing alteration in his years raising Aggie.   
Dr. Woodvale and Dr. Howell walked all the way to the third floor. Zeke was trying not to let on how out of shape he felt, yet he was very winded by the climb. Woodvale seemed stoic as ever, and he had to scuttle to keep up with her. Seconds later, they found themselves in one of the wards. Adult men, mainly of working age, lay idly in the different beds. Some had bandaged appendages, others had severe burns, and one man seemed to be bleeding profusely from his mouth.   
“Now,” his superior said, “you will be assigned to two wards during your stint here. The men’s’ ward, and the intensive care unit. I trust you have a strong constitution?”   
“Of course.”  
“Our intensive ward is reserved for our most extreme cases. Some of our nurses, primarily the women, can’t stomach the more complex cases. It’s not to say that you won’t work with a few of them who can, but there are some who refuse to work there. In addition, it may be requested that you make some rounds in the women’s ward or children’s ward. Fraternization with any of the female patients or staff is strictly prohibited.”   
‘Don’t worry,’ Zeke thought to himself. Sick women weren’t exactly attractive, and all the female nurses he’d met so far were in their twenties. Zeke had no interest in their immature behaviors.   
“Now, let’s walk down to the operating rooms. It’s highly unlikely you’ll need to perform any procedures after hours, but the aprons are kept in the dressing rooms, so you’ll need to know where they are.”   
“Down?”  
“Yes. The basement, actually.”   
Zeke’s feet hurt already.  
\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
The pot of chicken stew bubbled on the stovetop. It smelled divine, but Zeke was trying not to have any until Frieda and Carla returned from work. Zeke agreed to cook most of the meals while he was staying with them, given that his friends mostly came home late and exhausted. He didn’t mind; he liked cooking, actually. It could be done without much thinking, allowing his mind to cool down after the long day. After the hospital tour, and signing some new employee paperwork, Zeke was released for the rest of the afternoon. His first shift started at 9pm, so he spent the rest of the day doing some light cleaning and reading before it was time to make supper. He also took the opportunity to alter his new aprons, which, not to his surprise, were too long and had to be hemmed. Zeke would have to work 4 nights a week, from 9pm to 6am. It would be exhausting work, but he didn’t dare consider backing out. It had taken him far too long to just pitch the project, and to turn it down this far in would be a massive stain on his reputation at the university. No, he had to see it through.   
He knew Frieda and Carla would return home and ask him if he felt any different since the ovum was implanted, but he really didn’t. Zeke wasn’t surprised; it felt like it took eons for him to have any real symptoms when he carried Aggie. And the ovum was smaller than a pea at this point, which would hardly have any effect on him.   
He covered the pot and allowed the stew to simmer. The phone rang from the hallway, causing the man to jump and his heart to beat out of his chest. He wiped his hands and went to the telephone.   
“Asterson and Wilkins residence,” he answered, prepping the notebook that sat on the phone for an incoming message.  
“Papa?” Aggie’s tinny voice came through the receiver.  
“Oh,” Zeke felt himself smile, “hello, sweetheart. How was your day?”   
“It was alright,” her voice drifted.   
“Just alright? What did you do today? Are you excited for school to start?” Zeke didn’t want to overwhelm her with too many questions, but they hadn’t talked in at least a week.   
“I went with Shelley to the pharmacy, and we got some candy and dime novels. Then we met some of her friends in the park.”  
“Did you have a good time?” Zeke tried to hide the anxiety in his voice.   
Aggie paused. The line was silent, but Zeke could still hear her breathing.  
“Aggie? Honey?”   
“Papa, do you think…do you think I’m a freak?”   
His throat clenched and his mouth went dry. “Of course not, dearest. What makes you ask that?”  
Zeke could hear her breath shuddering; she was crying.   
“What happened?” He asked, more firmly this time.  
“Nothing. Never mind.”   
“Bea, listen to me, you are not a freak. No matter what anyone says. You are as normal as any other little girl, alright?” Zeke wished desperately that they were in the same room. He would have held her for hours on end until she felt better.   
“Okay.”  
“Do you believe me?”  
“Sure, Papa.”   
He could tell she didn’t.   
“Honey, whatever happened, I want you to tell Aunt Mary. I can telephone tomorrow and talk with her. This doesn’t have to happen again.”  
“Aunt Mary is mad at me.”  
“Why, baby?”   
“Because I came home with lots of scratches and bruises.”  
She’d been fighting. The picture was beginning to form in Zeke’s mind. She’d either picked a fight with Shelley or one of her friends because someone called her a freak, or something of the like.   
“Are you going to be alright?”   
“Maybe,” Aggie said. Her voice was very small.   
“I’ll call your aunt tomorrow and sort things out. I love you, Aggie Bea.”  
“Love you, too,” she muttered, then the line clicked.   
Zeke reluctantly replaced the receiver. He felt ill. Too ill to even feel angry. He knew he had to fix this somehow. In any way he could.


End file.
